


Caramel

by iisintrovert



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Barber Shop, Alternate Universe - High School, Body Dysphoria, Connie is hispanic, Eventual Smut, Gender Dysphoria, Italian, Jean has a lot of feelings, Jean is a stlylist, Jean is basically me, M/M, Marco is gay and caring, Nerd!Marco, Sexual Harassment, Smut and Fluff, Song fic, Trans Character, Trans Male Character, Trans! author amirite, Transphobia, Ymir is Marco's older lesbian sister bc i can???, based a bit of The Antlers album Hospice, chubby!marco, chubby!sasha, he's a smol birb, hes also mexican, if u count marco as white when he's still brown then fuck u, it's all super queer, jean s pretty much the only white character bc i felt like it, just cause, kirstein fam has no chill, marco speaking italian, marco tries to be funny, punk!jean, sasha will be here eventually, trans!jean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-26
Updated: 2016-07-02
Packaged: 2018-05-16 08:28:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 27,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5821333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iisintrovert/pseuds/iisintrovert
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marco joins the chess club at his new school, of course under the impression that there would be no interclub hierarchy that determined who got beaten up every day. Jean, being as caring as he is, steps in to help. Later Marco says something light hearted that ends up hitting home for Jean where it counts. Jean is trans, Marco is gay, and neither of their parents are exactly fond of those ideas.</p><p>Aka: the trans!au that no one asked for but I wrote because I have no self control and would rather write than deal with my own dysphoria</p><p>CHAPTER TEN WILL BE POSTED AROUND MIDNIGHT SATURDAY, 7/2/16</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Firsts

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so sorry

When Marco joined the chess club, he hadn’t anticipated such violent repercussions.

Maybe a couple of intense matches or snide comments in the hallways of his incredibly small high school, but not -- this. Whatever this was. Getting surrounded by a group of assholes with nothing better to do than target specific clubs. Luckily, he was the tallest out of the group, so he could probably fend off any major attack...if he was actually willing to hurt anything. He didn’t have it in him to throw a punch. There was some instinctual part of him that kept him from being willing to fight back. Of course. He was practically useless, especially when he was drowsy, walking through the hallway on his way to first period when all of a sudden all of his belongings were being torn from his grip.

“What the --” he muttered, before he joined his binder and school bag on the hard tile with a thump.

It took his tired brain to realize that this time, it wasn’t his own fault. His tailbone ached. He lifted his head from the ground, dizzy, before a foot shoved him back down from behind. _Ah,_ he thought dryly. _I see how it is._

Marco sighed, rolled his eyes, and brought himself to his feet evenly. There was no point in even turning around, especially not in stooping down to collect his things. No, he just needed to wait it out. Wait whatever it was that had planned -- out for it to happen, quickly, hopefully, so he could move on and head to class. He practically cocked his hip, looking down at his shoes in annoyance.

“What?” he asked, his voice sharp, almost hurt.

There wasn’t a response as he was shoved into the lockers next to him.

“Look at him! He’s not even fighting back!” one of the boys hollered.

Marco opened his eyes to see a sneering teenage boy, messy hair falling down his forehead. He was wearing a sweatshirt with the school’s logo, sleeves cut off at the shoulder, long sleeved shirt rolled up to his elbows to bare hairy arms. Fruity smelling breath hit his face. He pressed him against the hard metal slates of the locker with his forearms, the sharp protrusions dug into his back painfully. He gasped as the boy pulled his shoulders forward slightly just to slam him back into the lockers with a crash.

“Well?” the boy asked, snapping his gum, expecting some sort of plea. Marco didn’t respond. He simply stared him down, forcing the bored expression on his face. “You’re not going to fight back, or anything? _Beg,_ maybe?”

Marco looked down at his chest, covered by a thin t shirt and the crossed forearms of someone else and decided that things could definitely get worse. He sighed and met the eyes of the bully with a smile. “No?”

The boy just sneered at him and shoved him again. “Well then, I guess I’ll just have to make you.” he snarled. Marco’s eyes widened as the kid leaned up onto his toes (he was significantly shorter, anyway), snapping his gum loudly. He pulled one of his arms from its position and pulled the obscene wad of gum from his mouth and dangled it in front of Marco’s face.

“You wouldn’t,” he hissed.

The boy grinned malevolently.

Marco winced as the disgusting hunk of wet rubber neared his face, until suddenly, it stopped.

“Let go of him, you twat.” a slightly high-pitched voice called out.

The bully raised an eyebrow. “Excuse me?” he asked, turning to see a very skinny boy, about his height, shaking furiously.

“I said, let him go.”

Marco’s eyes widened at the proclamation. He wasn’t exactly very muscular, as you could see from how his dark blue button up hugged his shoulders, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows to reveal skinny forearms. He was quite hippy as well. The dark jeans on his legs tucked into lace-up black boots with enough heel to bring him to about the height of Marco’s shoulder. Without that, he was even shorter than the bully.

His hair was interesting as well. Marco had seen people with shaved sides, but most of them left only a rectangle of short hair at the top of their head. This kid had an odd shape of hair shaved, pointing down in the back like an exaggerated mohawk would, the hair on top fluffy like he had spent his entire life shampooing, conditioning, and combing his hair into oblivion every night. Marco couldn’t remember the last time he had put anything but soap in his own hair.

Not only was his hair shaved in some odd punk look, but the top was dyed a grayish blond in contrast to the darker brown of the shaved sides. And was that… _eyeliner?_ Coupled with a few ear piercings and his dark clothes, he should have been extremely intimidating. If it wasn’t for, you know --

“And what can you do to stop me, sweety?” the bully said mockingly, his grip loosening slightly as he turned his attention back to the boy behind him.

The boy clenched and unclenched his fists, not breaking eye contact, until his furrowed frown broke into a sharp grin. “I’ll tell your dad.”

Marco raised an eyebrow. Really? That was it?

The bully’s gaze faltered anyway. “You -- you’re bluffing.”

His grin just got wider. “He goes to the barbers for a haircut every month, doesn’t he? It would be a shame if someone were to, I don’t know, sit next to him and make small talk about how this awful kid at school does nothing but terrorize the innocent before casually dropping his name for the brilliant philanthropist himself to hear that his _own son_ had stooped low enough to be seen as a _bully_ \--”

“Shut up!” the boy yelled. “Fine. Fine, I’ll let him go, if you care so much, you fucking _queer._

Marco let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding, before he felt something warm, wet, and sticky plant firmly against the back of his head. The boy shoved him away as he took of running down the hall.

“Hey,” the boy asked. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” Marco answered instinctively. It was a lie, but he had been so used to just saying it that it didn’t really matter. He lifted a tentative hand to feel at the back of his head and -- bingo. His lip curled in disgust. “Gross,” he muttered, wiping his hand off on his pant leg.

The boy in front of him frowned. “What’s up?” he asked. Marco noticed that his voice was kind of raspy, but not in the same way a smokers would be. More like he was trying to speak quietly and with a deeper voice.

Marco shook his head, turning at the waist so he could see the waf of pink gum stuck to the base of his skull.

“Oh, yeah, that’s disgusting.” the boy said, furrowing his eyebrows. “I can’t stand assholes like him. First the Q-alliance, then -- what are you part of, the math club?”

“Chess.”

He snorted. “Figures. Honestly, it’s your own fault for being a dork.”

Marco looked down at him and frowned, before he realized he was just making a joke by the cheesy side smile the kid had adorned. He sighed, shaking his head again. He looked down at his watch. “Shoot, now I have to get this crap out of my hair in five minutes if I don’t want to be late for class.”

“I’ll help. It’s my fault, anyways.”

Marco looked at him in surprise. “You don’t have to. And it’s not your fault.”

The kid just sighed. “Just let me be self-depreciating without complaint.” He took Marco’s wrist and tugged him towards the men’s bathroom.

 

~~~~~

 

“You want the good news or the bad news first?”

Marco sighed, looking down at where his hands clutched the sink. “Hit me with the bad news.”

“This doesn’t look like it’s going to come out anytime soon.”

“Of course it won’t. Good news?”

Jean -- Marco had learned his name, and he had to say it fit him, the ‘j’ long and soft with the barely-heard ‘n’, perfect sounding with his slightly high voice -- the high voice that sounded quite like the caramel color of his eyes when he chuckled darkly. “The good news is I have a beanie in my backpack and my mom owns a barber shop.”

Marco’s face fell. “You’re serious? You think I need to get it cut out?”

“I think you need to get it _shaved_ out, actually.” he said softly, picking at the matted hair that had unfortunately fused with the sticky substance of strawberry flavored bubblegum.

Marco groaned.

Jean patted his back, and turned so he could dig around in his ratty black backpack. Marco watched him through the mirror. When he did resurface, it was with a red knit skull cap and a small business card. He handed both to Marco. “Here. Show up between four and seven tonight and I’ll give you a discount.” he said with a wink, before rushing off to find his class, leaving him alone in the bathroom with his thoughts.

Marco sighed into the mirror before tugging the fabric over his hair, adjusting it so that only the first inch after his hairline peaked out from the front. Today was going to be a long day.

 

~~~~~~

 

Dutifully, Marco showed up at the only local barber shop in town half an hour after he was finished with chess club.

It was chilly for September, the wind carrying the few yellowing leaves that had managed to fall early across the sidewalk as he trudged forward, pulling at the beanie on his head. Either to ensure the gum was covered or that his ears, stayed warm, even he wasn’t sure. He made it to the front of the small building just as a filthy used truck pulled up to the parking spot that read ‘Employees only.”

Loud, bass heavy music fell from the open windows as they were rolled up and the truck shuddered to a complete stop. Marco watched in fascination as Jean hopped down from the driver’s seat. He was wearing the same thing he had been at school, but he was wrapping an apron around his waist, unbeknownst to Marco standing there staring at him.

“Uh, hey!” he called out, startling Jean as he tied the string around his waist. Marco got a glimpse of the front of his apron, where it read in block letters ‘guaranteed shorter hair!’ _Well...it’s_ true _, but_ \--

“Like the apron?” Jean asked tiredly, a twinkle in his eye. “My mom thought it was fitting for me, considering I’m in training and not legally allowed to cut hair unless the patron understands they aren’t allowed to sue.” Seeing Marco’s worried look, he held up his hands in protest. “I mean, I can cut hair, and well, I’ve been doing my parents for as long as I can remember being allowed scissors,”

Marco just chuckled. “Man, my hair looks bad as it is. If you can manage to get it clean again then I don’t care if we have matching haircuts.”

Jean just scoffed. “Please, you’re jaw is too square for my hair. C’mon!” 

And with that, he hopped onto the platform before the doorway and led Marco inside and to the back of the small hair-care unit. Marco shivered from the sudden warmth and shrugged off his tweed jacket, letting it curve over his forearm. He rolled his shoulders and followed the boy who was trotting along the two rows of wheely chairs until he reached the very back and gestured for Marco to sit down.

Marco smiled when he saw the space arranged haphazardly, blades and clipper guards spilling from the open drawer, various spray bottles with different make-shift labels scattered across the surface of the small desk in front of a sparkling clean vanity mirror. His grin grew when he saw the goofy, lopsided polaroid selfie tapped to the corner of the mirror. It was of Jean, with slightly shorter and gelled up hair, his arms slung around a hispanic kid with a shaved head and some smiling girl with auburn hair. _Probably his girlfriend_ , he thought with disdain

The fact that it made him upset to think of this kid dating someone made him stop for a second, just to adjust his mood. _You’re trying to get a haircut, not a boyfriend, Bodt. Calm yourself._

He took a seat in the wheely chair.

Jean walked around the chair and turned it around so Marco faced the outside, unable to see his own reflection. “So,” he said, flicking a towel in front of him before wrapping it around his shoulders and clipping it in place. “Talk to me. Do you want an ‘I’m a fuckboy’ undercut or an ‘I’m just really queer’ undercut?”

Marco spluttered, looking down at his hands. “Are those really my only options? And isn’t that, like, a slur or something?”

“Those are pretty much the only haircuts I can give you with the state of your current hair.” he noted, pulling the beanie from his head and tossing it onto his desk. “And it’s only bad to say slurs if you’re using them in a derogatory manner or they don’t apply to you.”

“So…”

“So if there was a slur used to refer to cute people with freckles, then you could say it, if you wanted, and I couldn’t. Well, I couldn’t do so while being polite.”

“What about queer?”

Jean shot him a grin. “Yes.”

Marco assumed that would be about as much conversation on the topic from his side, and sighed, settling down comfortably into the cushy chair. “I guess you might as well make me look queer, then. Confirm everyone’s suspicions.”

“I think I like this one.” Jean hummed, flicking his wrist and turning on his clippers. “Would you like a moment to mourn your un-cool hairstyle?”

 

~~~~~~

 

“You’re serious? That actually happened?” Jean chuckled, looking up to stare at him incredulously as he trimmed at his bangs.

Marco giggled. “Not only did he cry, but this other kid, Maxwell or something, he just sits next to him and pulls a homemade Oculus Rift out of his pocket and hands it to him to cheer him up. Like crying after a lost chess match is just normal for them.”

“Wait, he just...you’re telling me he made a Rift?”

Marco tried to nod but was caught short by Jean’s steadying hand at his jaw. "Sorry. And yes, it was like a cardboard box and two old android phones, one of them split in half by a glass cutter to fit on the sides for maximum immersion. I asked him about it. He makes them with scraps and then sells them for two-hundred bucks a pop.”

“People afford that shit?”

“If people at our school can afford drugs, the ones with jobs can afford a back-alley video game console.”

Jean laughed, out loud and hearty. The sound made Marco want to smile. “Jeez,” he said, “Chess club has no chill. The queer alliance never has that much fun. It’s probably cause I’m the only gay one there, though.”

“Really?” Marco’s brow furrowed. “That system is pretty flawed.”

Chuckling, Jean reached behind him for another spray bottle and began to mist at the back of Marco’s neck. “You’re telling me.”

“Maybe I should join.” he scoffed. “If it’s only straight people, it would do good for them to meet more than one gay kid.”

Jean laughed. “Yeah, and get beaten up twice as much? I don’t think so.”

“C;mon, it would pay to have another vagina-hater on board.”

Marco felt the shift in mood immediately. He watched as Jean’s face fell, and even though he could see him try to pull his lips into another smile, Marco had seen. For a second, he had faltered. _Was that my fault?_ he cursed himself. _Was it something I said? Does he not like genitals or something?_

“Yeah, I guess.” Jean muttered, false cheer in his voice.

Marco looked down at his feet. _It’s me. It’s my fault. Oh god, he hates me. I’m insensitive and not worthy of friendships._

He didn’t respond until Jean unbuttoned the towel from his shoulders and tossed it underneath the desk into a small basket. “You’re good to go!” he said, voice chipper but eyes not conveying an of the emotion.

Marco stood up and looked at himself in the mirror. He looked pretty much the same, but with slightly shorter bangs and a parting that was just off from the center, but he could see from the mirror behind him that there was a shallow undercut sculpted into the back of his head, and the fuz on his neck was cleaned up and squared as well. “Thanks.” he said. He was being genuine, but Jean just gave him a half-hearted “You’re welcome,” and walked over to the cash register at the front of the store.

Half way up to the front of the otherwise empty building, there was a shrill sound of someone singing loudly, unbeknownst to anyone who might be listening.

Marco didn’t ignore the tensity of Jean’s shoulders under his button down. He stood in front of the front desk and pulled out his wallet before slipping his debit card over the desk for his half-price haircut, when the source of the singing stepped out from inside the office in the back of the building.

“Oh, Elizabeth, sweety I didn’t know you were working today,” Marco peered up to see a stout, middle-aged woman walking up to give Jean a hug and press a kiss to his temple before grabbing a broom from behind the counter and making her way back to sweep up his hair. “She giving you any trouble?” the woman asked, a glint in her eye and a playful smile on her lips.

Marco looked between the two of them -- at Jean’s shaking fist, at the woman who seemed oblivious to the fact that her child was staring out the window, unmoving -- and it all clicked together.

His voice was slightly high pitched. He was incredibly skinny, except for around the hips. Even when they had been in the men’s bathroom together, it was clear he had been quick to leave unseen. _Elizabeth?_ Marco wondered.

“Have a nice day.” Jean murmured, holding out the debit card with shaking fingers and without making eye contact.

Marco remembered what he had said.

Shit, man. You fucked up.


	2. Stress

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Getting into the plot...sorry not sorry

Marco couldn’t fall asleep.

This wasn’t actually unusual, when you got right down to it. With the amount of homework, school related stress, and bodily discomfort due to his terrible posture he could rarely get a good night’s sleep anyways.

This, however. This was different.

_Very different,_ Marco cursed himself with disdain. Of course, _of course_ he had fucked up in such a manner.

_You didn’t know, it’s not your fault!_ the self-serving part of his brain argued, but he knew it was wrong. He should have known better than to -- to what? What did he do, really? Refer to genitalia instead of gender? That was true! He doesn’t like girls or what’s in their pants.

Well, maybe.

The more he thought about it the more he was beginning to realize that just because he wasn’t a fan didn’t mean he didn’t think that Jean was still very attractive.

“Ugh,” Marco grunted, turning over in his bed and burying his nose in his blanket. He shouldn’t be feeling this bad. It was fine, really. He just needed to sleep, get up, and find the kid tomorrow and apologize. That was all. Apologies fix everything, right?

He sighed, pulling the covers up to cover his bare shoulders and chest. He should sleep. It wouldn’t be well to show up to school with bags under his eyes to apologize, he needed to smile and be sincere, not tired.

Marco closed his eyes and hoped sleep would come easier than social interaction.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Marco was lucky that literally everything was easier than social interaction.

He liked to think that he was pretty social for a teenager, but the truth was he couldn’t stand not knowing if what he was saying could hurt people or not. He was always more concerned with the consequences of his actions, and trying to find words that fit perfectly...that was stressful. Hella.

But it was necessary. And he was going to do what was necessary.

It had plagued him all morning -- He _knew_ Jean was upset, he was positive. He wasn’t exactly sure why or how or...or what about Jean made what he said so terrible it made him look like he wanted to cry, but when he got back down to it, it was his fault.

Marco never was good at apologies.

He made his way into the main building of his school, wadded through the thin crowd of people, and got to his locker. He heard a locker door slam, and winced violently. After the...incident, yesterday, he was even more jumpy than usual, and that was saying something. He could have sworn his feet left the ground for a second.

“Sorry,” someone muttered, rushing past him with a bag clutched to their chest.

Marco hummed in response, before perking up. _Was it…_

He turned and peered over the heads of people in the crowded hallway with frustration, searching for -- there he was. He saw a petite tuft of bleached hair among the others, rushing away in a hurry.

Away from _him._

Marco forgot about his locker. He instead shouldered his bag quickly and slammed his own locker shut, rushing off in pursuit of the shorter boy who seemed very determined to shake him from his trail. He threw open the heavy metal door leading out into the courtyard, Marco following not far behind. He trotted towards the science building.

Marco didn’t know how he felt about how his eyes were immediately drawn to how his ass looked in the incredibly tight jeans he was wearing, and how he immediately made comparisons to boys he had “definitely not” checked out.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts and ran up to the entryway to the building. He skidded to a stop right before Jean could step into one of the classrooms and held his arms out, partially as a sign of peace, and partially to keep him from going anywhere.

“Stop,” he gasped out. “I was calling for you.”

Jean raised an eyebrow in an attempt to be cocky, but just huffed and crossed his arms in front of his chest, looking away in embarrassment. “What do you want?” he deadpanned.

Marco’s face fell. “I just...I wanted to apologize. I was kind of an asshole, and I shouldn’t have --” he trailed off, noticing Jean’s… _peculiar_ expression. “What is it?”

“You -- You’re sorry?”

Marco was taken aback. “Wh- of course I’m sorry! It was my fault, I said something that wasn’t right of me to say, in any case, especially in any sort of case involving...well, you know what I mean.” He mumbled.

He looked down at his feet, ready for him to chew him out, but was surprised. A high-pitched, musical laugh met his ears.

“You’re apologizing! That’s certainly a first,” he chuckled, shaking his head ruefully. He didn’t look completely content, but there was something there, a hint of a smile, and Marco let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding in.

He looked up, blushing, and shyly met eyes with him. Jean shook his head with disdain.

“Jesus, if I’d have known you were going to apologize, and not beat me up, I wouldn’t have ran away.”

Marco frowned. “Beat you up? Who’s going to beat you up?”

Jean rolled his eyes. He adjusted the strap of his backpack, grabbed his arm, and tugged him off to the side a bit so someone could walk through the door into his classroom. He looked over his shoulder just incase, before gritting his teeth. “I hate to break it to you freckles, but we live in South Dakota. I’m about to be banned from using the bathroom if the bill goes through.”

“Wh-- that’s happening?”

“Yes, it’s happening, and unfortunately, I’m so far in the closet that it’s going to kick my ass.”

Marco paused in his thought process. “Yeah, about that, what --”

Jean smacked a hand over his mouth and shushed him, looking over at the three lacrosse players currently entering his next class. “Just…” he sighed. “Come to H-3 this afternoon. I’ll be there.”

He turned, hunched over in his bulky sweatshirt, and walked swiftly into the room, leaving Marco to wonder.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Terrible thoughts plagued him all day. During his test in second period he couldn’t help but imagine every dangerous scenario in his head until finally his mind caught on one particular memory: a few boys messing around in one of his classes last year, just loud enough for Marco to have caught the words “I can’t wait to meet one so I can beat it up.”

He eventually finished his test, before excusing himself to the bathroom and nearly threw up.

But he made it. At the end of the day, he stealthily found his way to “H” hall and entered the third room on the left.

There were more people than he had expected. The incredibly small school probably had a lot more queer people than this.

Marco frowned at the thought, remembering that the majority of them were probably too scared to even be seen in such a place when it was almost guaranteed to get them bullied.

He sat down in one of the closest desks, all arranged in what looked like it could have been a circle, and plopped his bag on the floor. The door slammed behind him. Jean came through, looking like he had ran their from the other side of the school (which he probably had). He was practically wheezing.

“Hey, are you okay?” Marco asked, standing up as if to help him into a seat.

Jean waved him off. “Fine, fine, I’m fine, I just have mesh wrapped tightly around my rib cage that prevents me from being able to breath completely properly.”

Marco winced. “That sounds awful.”

He chuckled mirthlessly, shaking his head. “You’re telling me. It hurts like a bitch and it doesn’t even work completely.”

“Do you have an injury, or --” Marco caught himself at Jean’s glare, eyebrow raised in question. “Oh.” was all he could muster.

“What, catching yourself thinking I’m cis, did you?” Jean asked, laughing a bit before he got too winded for even that. “I think I like you, freckles.”

GSA was...interesting, to say the least. There was no sort of agenda or meeting plan (well, one kid, Hanji, Jean said their name was, wrote “The Gay Agenda” on the whiteboard, but no one actually suggested any conversation topics, so they left it as such). It just seemed to be some sort of oasis -- a safe space for anyone to talk about anything going on without the threat of being bullied or abused. A few in the corner were off affirming each other’s belief in Planned Parenthood, a guy and a girl were gushing about the newest gay character on a popular TV show, and Hanji was ranting about intersectional liberal feminism to the teacher who seemed to be in some sort of charge of their chaos.

Marco was just taking it all in, when someone dropped by where he and Jean were sitting and offered them pink, white, and blue striped buttons with the words “black trans lives matter” on them, and he fell in love.

He wasn’t even sure what half of them were talking about.

He looked back over to Jean, who was plucking at the ends of his frayed sweat-shirt sleeves, and frowned.

“Aren’t you cold?” he asked. The thin gray cloth didn’t look like enough to keep out a meager chill, and he was only wearing jeans and sneakers underneath it.

Jean shrugged. “A bit. I wear this pretty much every day, ‘cause none of my shirts really fit the way I want them to. It’s fine, though. I’m going to go shopping by myself as soon as my grandma sends me birthday money, so I won’t have to wear whatever my mom picks out.”

“You could -- I mean, I -- well not me, my brother, but anyway…” Marco cleared his throat. “My brother just left for college this year, and he left me a bunch of old clothes. None of it really fits me because he was shorter. You could look through the stuff if you want.”

Jean perked up, his caramel eyes shining. “Really? That would be great? I’d have to repay you somehow, but…” he sighed, looking down at the torn ends of his pants. “Shit, I really need clothes and I’m not about to go back to blouses and tank tops.”

“I could drive over this weekend, if you want. With the clothes.” Marco stammered out, nerves frayed. He wasn’t sure quite why. There wasn’t much else he could say that would hurt him, but something about being around him...it made him feel like he could be doing more. _It’s probably because you looked at his ass, you creep,_ part of him argued. Marco kindly told that side of him to shut the fuck up.

Jean looked elated for a moment, before his face fell again to distraught. “That probably wouldn’t be good.” he muttered. “My mom...She’d ask too many questions. Well, she might -- never mind, that’s ridiculous.”

“What?” Marco asked, before begging any god that existed to retract the word back into his mouth.

“We could...well, _you_ could pretend to be taking me on a date or something, when actually we could just drive somewhere and I could look through the clothes there?” Jean asked, wincing slightly. “I don’t know, It would be too much to ask.”

“I’ll do it.” Marco affirmed, looking down at his watch. “I have to go soon, though, or my mom’ll be worried. Here, I’ll give you my number. Text me your address and we can figure something out.”

Jean put a hand on his shoulder as he stood up, looking him in the eye with perhaps the most sincere look Marco had seen on him. “Thank you.” he said.

Marco grinned. “I’m glad to.”

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Later that night, Marco woke up to the bright light of his cell phone buzzing on his desk. Normally, it wouldn’t be a problem, considering he had few friends to speak of, but that only set a pang in his chest. He knew who it had to be.

He pushed the covers off his arms and reached for the phone, only to see the message on the screen and turn back around to groan into his pillow.

**From: Jean**

**Hey m’fam, sorry to bother u but I may or may not have tried to convince my mom that I’m “a hetero” by telling her that we’re dating...no presure tho**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lmao i'm a slut for pretend dating fics of course I'm going to write one. Follow me on tumblr I'm iisintrovert on there as well


	3. We move lightly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I recommend listening to Castle Comer - Fire alarm, and False Nines - can't afford to wonder for this one. IT's also the longest chapter yet, so apologies for the wait!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plot heavy, and fluffy, but not at the angst quite yet.../for now/

To say Marco was stressed was an understatement.

He had planned to meet up with Jean at around two, so he started to get ready at around eleven o’clock like a normal person -- yeah, there was definitely something wrong with that.

The amount of time he had allotted himself was only stressing him out even more. He could feel the pressure growing in his chest exponentially as he pulled himself from bed around ten-thirty and readied himself a cup of white coffee with three sugars, before peering in the mirror and realizing it was going to take him more than a few minutes to tame his new haircut into something manageable. The tight feeling of uneasiness in his abdomen took hold of his lungs and squeezed.

“Breathe, Bodt,” he muttered to himself, shaking his head gently and taking a long, relaxing sip from his mug of coffee. There was more creamer than actual caffeine, but the sugar did the trick and before long he felt the familiar buzz of energy return to his sleepy limbs. It was Saturday. The day of possibility. The day in which he was going on a maybe-sort of-possibly-probably… _date_.

He sighed, looking at himself in the mirror once more, fingers running through the off-kilter part of his hair. It wasn’t _that_ bad...nothing a bit of water and hair gel couldn’t fix. It was just...time consuming. Marco could _not_ be late.

Marco gave himself a wide smile (he had heard once that faking smiles can artificially raise your happiness levels) and set his coffee mug on the bathroom counter with a loud clink. He could do this. He was ready.

It only took him about twenty minutes to tame his hair completely in the style he wanted, and then another five to wash his face and shave. Clothing, however, was a whole other story. He didn’t exactly know the etiquette for real date, much less fake straight and sort-of gay meet-up -- _shit._

Marco paused half way through buttoning up the third shirt he had picked out. He really did not need to be thinking about this like it was a date. It was, in a sense, a manner of convincing Jean’s mom that he was totally straight and Normal™, so he did have to appear like he was taking him on a date, but he couldn’t...Marco just couldn’t try to make this into a thing. A gay thing. A kind of bisexual thing. A possibly awkward friendship thing. Judging by how he was handling just this, he definitely did not need for this to be a thing of any sort.

Clearing his mind, he faced his full-length mirror. He had decided on greenish-tan pants that tapered at the ankles, with black Vans, but couldn’t decide what the mood of this whole “date” would be. A casual nice-tee shirt out to the movies date? A semi-formal lunch date? A “I’m super preppy and really respect your son,” button up and sweatervest date? He considered texting Jean to ask him, but then decided against it.

He just had to find somewhere in the middle. Something comfortable. Effortlessly cool.

With a sigh, Marco scolded himself for putting so much effort into something that was supposed to be effortless.

In the end, he decided on a black and white horizontally-striped tee shirt with a dark denim button up, open and with the sleeves rolled up. Perfect for any dating extravaganza.

Perfect.

Right?

The only problem was that Marco may or may not have overshot exactly how long it would take him to get ready. And now he had a whole hour to sit and wait for his nervousness to fester. Perfect.

Today was just turning out to be the most cynical perfection ever.

Deciding that there was no point waiting, Marco shuffled into his brother’s room and opened the doors to his walk-in closet. He hadn’t spent much time there, for obvious reasons, but looking around, he began to realize just why his brother Giuseppe spent so much time hidden away. The closet was like a small oasis. A square foot of window provided some gray natural light, a few beanbags on the floor with a ratty old throw, a couple posters for indie-rock bands he favored surveying the area like watchmen, it gave the room a sort of homey comfort.

Marco sat down on one of the beanbags, careful not to wrinkle his shirt, and leaned back into the drywall. He let out a loud sigh.

Sufficiently calm, he grabbed the three trash bags full of clothes and slung them over his broad shoulders.

 

~~~~

 

With the clothing in his car and a travel mug of coffee in his hand, Marco pulled out of his driveway at precisely twelve-forty-five.

He tapped at the beat up steering wheel of his old-school ford nervously. Anxious energy coursed through his veins like a shot of caffeine. With of a shake of his head, he nudged a cassette into the opening on his dashboard and let the first few rifts of a smooth Indie song flow through his old speakers. He had made the mixed tape a week or so ago from a youtube playlist of “calming and inspiring writing music.” It did the trick.

Stress melted through him as he allowed himself to melt back into his faux-leather seat to the upbeat, futuristic melody of the singer. He flicked his mirror down to look at the old postcard he had used to write down the song names and saw that it was a track by some band called Local Natives. Hm. He’d have to look them one up.

Considering how often he was thinking about reducing stress, Marco started to second guess signing up for three advanced placement classes and an honors for second semester. Especially when he still had to go to study groups for the spring exams of the two APs he had taken in the former. Maybe three hours of homework every night, plus four hours of studying was more than his fragile spirit could handle, but it was that, or not get a full ride to school.

And not getting a full ride to college meant not _going_ to college.

With the windows rolled down all the way and the music cranked up to the loudest it could be while still having a calming air, Marco drove off. The peaceful drawl of the singers voice reverberated in his chest like the wing beats of a bird, strangely centering and certainly distracting from the anxiety plaguing him there.

Following the directions on his phone, Marco drove until he was ten minutes away from Jean’s house before he realized that he was still incredibly early. What if he showed up early? Would that be better? They could sneak away without having to talk to either of his parents, which might be considered preferable for Jean, but what if they thought he was untrustworthy?

He gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles went white, leaning forward until his forehead rested against his dashboard. The vibration resonated deep in his head. Marco tried to imagine the waves clearing his mind of all confusion and anxiety.

Marco turned the music down and sat back in his seat. He peeled his fingers away from the wheel and reached into his pocket, pulled his phone out and tapped out a quick text.

**To: Jean**

**Hey I know this is like super early but how do you want me to do this Should I come early? Do u want to sneak out so we don’t have to talk -**

He sighed, erasing the message and staring down at his phone screen.

**To: Jean**

**when should I come over to pick u up? Im ready whenever**

Marco read the message over a couple times, debating on whether or not he should correct the capitalization and spelling, before just getting it over with and hitting send, before flinging his phone into the seat beside him.

The reply message was almost instantaneous.

**From: Jean**

**You can come over anytime, really. My dad isn’t here so everything’s good.**

Marco let out a sigh. Slight comfort from the adjustment of time, slight discomfort of the suggestion of parental...whatever that was. Fear?

He didn’t want to think about someone being truly afraid of one of their parents.

He typed out a confirmative, letting Jean know he would be their soon, and pulled his truck into gear.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Jean’s house was gorgeous. Front facing gabels, white siding, newly tiled roofing, and a wrap around porch (risky, but on this house it was elegant) and a perfectly manicured lawn. Not only that, but it was also three stories tall. A whole two stories taller than Marco's house. _Of course, he's rich._

After dwelling on if it would be tacky to text that he was right outside or not (for more than five minutes, no less) Marco was startled by a knock on his passenger side door. He peered up to see Jean’s smiling face waving at him cheekily, pointing down to the locked door.

“Hey,” he said breathlessly, climbing up into the seat. He nodded towards Marco’s hands braced with his cell phone. “Whatcha doing?”

“Uh, texting your- mom. I mean, my mom! You! Kind of…”

Jean raised an eyebrow, but ignored his stammering respectfully. “Alright then.” He rubbed his hands together in a mockery of enthusiasm. “You got cool clothing?”

“It’s like Macy’s up in here.”

“For a not-white person, that was an incredibly white sentence.”

Marco grinned, anxiety melting away as he pulled the car into gear again and pulled out of Jean’s driveway. “That would be hilarious if I wasn’t actually technically white.”

Jean chuckled, leaning forward and tucking his hands in between his legs. He seemed a bit nervous. Marco could relate.

“So,” he blurted out. “Do you want to go get fast food or something? We could stop and look through the clothes at the park, if you want.”

Jean scrunched up his nose. “Fast food? Really, Bodt? I thought you were better than that.”

With a roll of his eyes, he nudged his mixed tape back into the slot and turned the volume up to a level that was only just noticeable. “What’s wrong with a bit of low-cost carbo loading?”

“Have you played a sport in your life?”

“Yeah, I’m a big fan of the...sports ball.”

Jean cracked a cheeky grin. “I don’t think fast food would be the best idea.”

“Don’t want to ruin your bench press with a nice hamburger?”

“Uh, try I haven’t eaten meat in three years, and the last time someone tricked me into doing so I barfed my internal organs up.”

Marco sucked air in through his teeth. “Yikes. Vegetarian?”

“Involuntary vegan.” He shrugged, picking at the loose strings of his worn light-wash jeans. Again, he was wearing the same pair with a loose sweatshirt that had most definitely seen better days. “My mom has weird health phases, and this one stuck long enough for my intestines to kick my ass if I break it.” He perked up a bit, noticing the song playing and fingered the dashboard until the volume picked up a considerable amount. “Syd Matters!” he grinned. “You listen to this?”

Marco shrugged noncommittally. “Yeah, kinda.”

“How do you only ‘kinda’ listen to one of the best sort-pop indie bands? Especially this song, man, get with it.” He leaned back into his seat with his eyes closed, humming along to the chords in the background and tapping out the drums on his knee.

Marco let out a breath through his nose. He really didn’t listen to bands, more individual songs, but the futuristic vibe the song had and the vocals...he guessed he could probably look them up when he got home. For himself, of course. Not because Jean recommended them. That would be silly.

“I just downloaded it because it was peaceful.” he said honestly, peering over and smiling at how Jean’s posture seemed to melt into the worn faux-leather of the seat behind him.

He kept tapping his fingers peacefully, not opening his mouth, until the chorus came along. Jean reached over and lowered his window all the way and belted out the first line in an incredibly loud alto.

“Can’t afford to wonder! Can’t afford to know!” He sang at the top of his lungs, nearly shouting out the windows. Marco jumped nearly a foot in his seat.

“What the hell, Jean?” He asked, grinning ear to ear.

Jean shot him a cheeky look and continued, practically screaming the lyrics at the top of his lungs until Marco was tearing up with laughter.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

By the time they got to the vegan joint, Marco’s body felt alleviated of all stress that had been burdening him. Singing “Free Falling” at the top of his lungs as wind hit his cheeks was quite possibly the best thing that could have happened to him that week. Excluding meeting up with Jean, of course.

He parked the car, peering out the window at the new restaurant, for once not feeling totally nervous about entering a new place without knowing what he was going to be ordering. Jean hopped out beside him and tugged him along.

The building was small, about half the size of a normal fast-food place, painted beige with pale green accents on the roof shingles and siding. Patio seating out front looked over the patch of grass that separated the restaurant from the road and the rest of the strip mall.

He stood in front of the restaurant and pulled a pair of glasses out of his pocket, using them to read the menu. Marco followed suit, head tilted forward against the sun to peer at the menu. Jean rubbed his hands together in mocking anticipation. “New types of veggie burgers? It’s like Christmas.”

Marco chuckled. “More like Halloween, you vegan nerd.”

Rolling his eyes, Jean stood up and walked over to the building, pulling the door open and stepping inside. Marco followed, shocked by how cold it was inside. Jean seemed to shiver himself under only his threadbare sweatshirt. Marco frowned, and moved to pull of his jacket, before he really started to wonder at the implications. Should he? That would not only be cheesy, (and extremely gay) but it might be taken the wrong way. What if Jean didn’t like him that way? What if he took it the wrong way?

He just couldn’t help himself. It was against his -- his everything, to sit there as Jean shivered, hugging himself in the only proper sweatshirt he owned. He shrugged off his army green jacket and gingerly hung it around Jean’s shoulders. He was perfectly fine himself.

Jean looked up in surprise, hands gripping the hem around him. With how broad Marco was, the jacket hung off him, especially taking into account his skinny frame, but he seemed to be relieved to have it wrapped around him. “You don’t have to, if you’re cold.” He said, looking into Marco’s gaze.

“Keep it for now. I’ll be fine. A little air conditioning never hurt anyone.”

Grinning, Jean stepped up to the cash register, stuffing his lanky arms into the sleeves. “Hello!”

The boy at the register didn’t look nearly as enthusiastic, but he returned Jean’s greeting with a nod. “How can I help you?”

“I’ll take a barbeque veggie burger and a lemonade.”

Marco stepped up beside him, deciding just to nod and say “The same, please.”

He started to rummage around in his pocket for his wallet, but Jean nudged him with his elbow. He rolled his eyes. “Please. I have too much money, let me buy you a damn veggie burger. Make my dad pay for how he feels about me.”

Marco chuckled, but backed off. Jean handed the man a few bills and stepped back to lean against the wall next to him.

After a few minutes, they collected their food and meandered outside, burgers and plastic cups of lemonade in hand. Marco’s stomach growled just at the scent of the warm food. He couldn’t wait to tear into it, despite the fact that it actually contained no meat. It smelled delicious.

“Mmh, good choice, Jean.” he noted. “It smells so good.”

Jean chuckled. He placed his container down on the picnic table, taking a quick sip from his lemonade before placing that down as well, and nodded for Marco to follow him. He trotted up to the back of the truck and leaned through the open window, turning up the music until they could hear it at a regular level from just outside the truck. “Is this okay?” He called.

Marco jogged up to him, nodding, and threw open the back of the truck. He grabbed the plastic bags and hefted them over his shoulders.

For the next few hours, they searched through Giuseppe's old clothes together. It was ridiculous, how much old clothing he had to spare, but Marco was greatful if only for the look of pure joy on Jean’s face when he pulled and untangled another piece of clothing that would fit him. They laughed together, giggling at the hideous brown sweater vest they found at the bottom of one of the bags. When they got to the sparkly gold sweatpants...Marco gave up trying not to judge his brother (Jean kept the pants anyway, saying that they matched his aesthetic and could help reflect unwanted gender stereotypes with how shiny they were).

Jean found a few items that he wanted to try on immediately, and quickly folded them and put them off to the side.

Another thing that Marco was just recently noticing -- how attractive glasses were. Well, how attractive they looked on Jean. Every time he peered up to sneak a totally-no-romo glance at his smile, Jean seemed to look through the thin lenses at him in quite possibly the hottest way possible. It reminded him of an old Anime he had watched once in middle school. _“One must never forget how effective a glance to the side can be.”_

Geez Louise.

By the time they had finished finding every possible item that would fit Jean properly, it was almost dark. They had a good time. Marco didn’t feel like it was a waste of a day at all, instead surprised, and perhaps a bit upset that it had gone by so quickly.

“-okay?” Jean asked, startling Marco out of his thoughts.

“Sorry? I was a bit...zoned out for a second there.” He said, blushing with a grin all the while, rubbing the base of his head sheepishly.

“Could you go into the bathroom with me? I just want to try these on. You know...for kicks.” It was Jean’s turn to blush. He looked away, clearly embarrassed by his request. Perhaps feeling as though Marco wasn’t paying attention to him for a reason. The waning moon was just barely visible among the clouds of the darkening sky. Marco snuck a better peak at Jean’s face, noticing how his tawny hair reflected the weak sunlight well, how it fell across his cheekbones. The limited lighting of the park suited him perfectly.

Marco grabbed his hand and tugged him to his feet, ignoring the abandoned (and cold) veggie burger in front of him. “C’mon, let’s get you in those clothes.”

Jean’s face split with a grin.

 

~~~~~~~~~~

 

“Okay, I’m going to come out, don’t look just yet.”

“What -- why?”

“Just...let me see myself first. Turn around. I know the mirror is right there, you’ll see me anyway.”

Marco sighed, shaking his head, but did as Jean said. He made a three sixty turn towards the grimy mirror behind him. Jean unlocked the door and stepped out slowly.

His eyes met his own reflection in the mirror, and Marco heard his breath catch for a split-second as he stared, mesmerized by the sight of himself. It wasn’t much -- but a pair of well fitting jeans and proper clothes could do loads towards someone’s self esteem, Marco knew that.

Jean looked incredibly punk, with worn dark-wash jeans hugging his calves but falling just loose enough in the hips and thighs, a gray tee-shirt that billowed over his chest, and a red plaid jacket that fell just above the middle of his thighs with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and a dark beanie...Marco’s own breath caught in his throat as he caught sight of Jean’s face.

Absolute wonder, amazement, _happiness,_ but most of all, an odd sense of realization and familiarity with his appearance as if this was what he was supposed to look like the entire time and he had _finally found it._

And then his face split into a cheeky grin and he turned directly into Marco’s chest and was pulling him closer. His eyes tore away from the reflection and down at the boy before him.

They were so close, Jean’s forehead resting against his collarbone, arms wrapped around him with fingers knotted in the soft fabric of his jacket, now returned, feet touching, knees bumping awkwardly, and again -- Marco was struck with terrible familiarity.

But he still wasn’t sure how he felt about that.

That night, Marco wrapped himself in his army jacket, the hem brought up to his nose, breathing in that scent of pine and peppermint, lulling himself off to sleep despite the pang in his chest ragging along.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> protest the anti-transgender laws that have been passed in my home state, North Caronlina!!!!! http://www.bustle.com/articles/149967-how-to-protest-north-carolinas-anti-transgender-pro-discrimination-law-because-hb2-must-be-stopped  
> Basically, the bill legalized lgbt+ discrimination and made it illegal for transgender people to use the correct bathrooms, which can cause them to be outed, and put in extremely dangerous situations, especially trans women and trans women of color. Please dear lord help me and this goddamned state by ding some research, and make sure to vote democrat if you can for state legislators to protect your own states.


	4. Just Us Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Two" by The Antlers.
> 
> Plot, and some fluff, and some bilingual Marco and mom. Sorry this is so short, I'm doing campnanowrimo. Expect a better chapter next fri/Saturday!!!
> 
> Also I did cosplay for this fic, so if you wanna check my face out bc I look fucknijng hot:  
> https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/the-mega-trans-sjw/142871354351

Marco knew something was wrong when he woke up and Jean hadn’t returned his text from last night. He felt it, in his chest, knew he was overreacting, and yet -- he couldn’t shake the feeling of uneasiness.

_Stop overreacting, Bodt_ , he told himself, ignoring the pit of anxiousness harboring thoughts in his gut, and drove to school.

That day, Jean wasn’t there.

Marco hadn’t noticed until his third period, which he normally shared with Jean, and the substitute teacher called out his name (well, his birth name), and everybody looked around, confused. There wasn’t an Elizabeth in their class, was there?

But no, he didn’t answer. Marco peered behind him and saw his empty seat by the window.

By then, the nerves were ricocheting throughout his body, lighting him on fire. Marco sent two more texts his way.

_Are you okay?_

_Why aren’t you at school?_

No answer. Marco skipped QSA that afternoon and went straight home.

In the car, he listened to the mix he had promised to burn JEan, and debated typing out another text and hitting send.

_Are you safe? Should I come get you?_

_No,_ he thought to himself. _That’s too over the line. He’s okay. He has to be._

Marco knew in his heart that he was probably wrong, and yet...he still couldn’t bring himself to do anything about it.

That night, as he went to sleep, he told himself over and over again that he was just sick, maybe from the food, and too embarrassed after crying to text him this soon. _Yeah, that must be it. That has to be it._

The next morning, Jean walked up to his locker with his hood up over his bushy hair, hands almost visibly shaking in his jacket pockets. He wasn’t wearing the jacket Marco had given to him -- in fact, he didn’t seem to be wearing any of the clothing Marco had lent him. He was slouching as well, his chest too flat to be normal and his breathing shallow as far as he could hear. Marco immediately felt his heart pang with pain.

“Marco, I need to talk to you,” he got out, looking over his shoulder just as a foot ball hit him in the back of the head. Marco turned around swiftly and glared at the offender -- a beefy, dark haired football player, one who looked quite familiar to Marco -- who was grinning savagely and receiving high fives and claps on the back from fellow team mates.

“C’mon, man, don’t be such a douche,” Eren Jaeger pipped up, but he just sneered.

“Why are you defending it? It’s their own fault.”

He bristled, and shot the football team a glare. _It. They had called him ‘it’._ Pacifist he was, he felt like punching them all in the neck.

Jean tugged at his sleeve and said quietly. “Come _on_ , it’s not worth it. Please, just…”

He sighed and Marco picked up where he was meaning to leave off. “I’ll take you to my truck and you can tell me everything.” Jean relaxed visibly. He followed him closely, staying at his elbow as they made their way through the crown of students in their tiny hallway, ignoring the occasional “Oh, excuse me _ma’am,_ didn’t see you,” and the ever eloquently put “look! It’s the two queers!”

Marco’s jaw was clenched so tightly he was afraid it would explode.

They finally made it to Marco’s truck and climbed into the cabin, before Jean coughed loudly and absolutely broke down.

His head fell into his hands, and he scratched at his face, dry sobs heaving through his frame as he curled his knees up to his chest and buried his nose in them.

“Jean, what’s wrong?” he whispered, hesitantly reaching out to comfort him. He curled his fingers back at the last second. He was afraid -- for Jean, but also for himself, too nervous that he was going to scare him away or not do enough for him. He just didn’t know what to do.

 

Jean sucked in a breath, hands and fingers shaking profusely. “I first realized I had to hide things from my family when I was thirteen. My dad read some news article and decided it was okay to tell me that ‘trans people reject humanity, and therefore shouldn’t be respected.’ I’ve been scared to tell him ever since.” A shudder wracked through his body. “And now I know there just wasn’t any _point._ ”

Marco patted him on the back and wound his arms around his shoulders. “You’re going to be okay,” he muttered, rubbing soothing circles into his skin. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

“But you don’t understand,” Jean cried out. “I could have gotten it off my chest ages ago, even when I wasn’t ready, and he still would have acted the same! And now...now I have no where. It’s not safe there, but I have to go home anyway.

A physical pain wracked through him, and Marco tensed up. “What do you mean by ‘safe,’ Jean?”

Jean looked up, tipping the hood of his sweatshirt up to reveal his face. His angular chin pointed, his eyes furious and full of emotion, a dark black bruise blooming against his cheek bone. His bottom lip was also broken.

Marco gasped audibly. “Jean…” he leaned forward, hand out, and thumbed over the bruise. As Jean winced at the contact, he pulled his hand away and grit his teeth together. “That’s it. You’re coming home with me.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Marco texted him mom to let her know vaguely what was happening, thumbed a tape into the dashboard, turned the volume up and drove.

It was silent the whole way there.

Neither of them minded, of course, it didn’t matter to them whether or not there was conversation, they just listened to the music and breathed. Jean remained curled up in his seat, head against the window. His fingers danced along the sides of his own ribcages absentmindedly. The songs that played were all pretty chill, chill enough to calm Marco down and to be enjoyable, but eventually one turned on that made Jean perk up.

“Two,” he mumbled under his breath. “I know this album. Have you listened to it?””

Shaking his head, Marco coked an eyebrow and looked over at him.

Jean hummed. “You should. It’s really emotional. In order, it tells a really sad story. It’s worth listening to. It’s called Hospice, by The Antlers.”

Marco just nodded. The lyrics themselves were too quiet to hear over the instrumentals, but he could just barely hear the low, loud crooning of the singer at the faster paced bits of the song.

Jean reached over and turned the volume up all the way. The strum of the guitar wasn’t as overpowering as he thought -- in fact, it melded perfectly with the singer’s low pitched, smooth voice. The disturbing part was that the lyrics told a story, one that Marco hadn’t even realized he was paying attention to.

_“There was nothing that I could do to save you/ the choir's gonna sing and ‘this thing is gonna kill you’.  
“And something in my throat made my last words shake/ something in the wires made the light bulbs break.”_

Marco was stunned. He hadn’t known it was possible to listen to the song’s lyrics. Now that he was hearing them for the first time, the actual music itself sounded so much… _sadder._

The song told the story of a woman in hospital care who is told her illness is terminal. It was narrated by her fiance.

_“No one’s gonna fix it for us_ no one can, _you say that no one’s gonna listen, no one understands,”_

Jean was leaning back in his seat, mouthing along to the lyrics as they described how the doctors thought the woman, who was mentally ill, was lying about how much physical pain she was in.

Marco felt his heart contract just looking at him.

And suddenly, he felt an overwhelming emotion crash over him.

He wasn’t sure why, but it just made him want to protect Jean even more.

A somber smile crossed his face, and his fingers clenched over the wheel of the truck. _It’s just going to be us two_. He thought. The same emotion rolled over him again. It wasn’t confusing this time, but comforting. Kind.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Marco’s mom was a plump woman. She had kind eyes, a brilliant smile, and was almost perpetually tired looking. She was lovely.

Just as he had suspected, the moment he walked in the door, Jean trailing behind him with eyes downcast, she pulled them both in for a bone crushing hug.

“Oh, my lord, you are much too skinny, my dear! It’s Jean, correct?” she asked, pronouncing his name like “gene,” but Jean didn’t bother correcting her. He just nodded politely and stepped back, partially out of respect and partially to avoid another tight hug. Marco looked at him with worry in his eyes.

“Yes, his name is Jean,” Marco gave his mother a pointed look. “Could you help me get the mattress down from the closet upstairs? He’ll want to sleep on that, not the blow up one.”

Marcia Bod nodded, immediately understanding the unspoken. She smiled kindly at Jean and took him by the elbow. “Come with me, _Caro_ , let’s get you something to eat.”

She tugged him into the open kitchen and sat him down at the head of the wooden table, before digging around in the fridge for a container of the soup they had eaten the night before. She spooned out a hearty portion into a bowl and placed it in the microwave, before pulling bread out of the cupboard and slicing it.

The microwave beeped, and Marco took over buttering the bread as Marcia fixed Jean a plate with the bowl of soup, buttered bread, and some raw baby carrots. “Here you go, _Tesoro_ , just eat up and sit right there. Marco and I will get your things set up upstairs in his room.”

Jean nodded politely, mumbling a quiet “thank you,” before Marcia grabbed Marco’s wrist with an iron grip and tugged him all the way upstairs.

She planted her hands on her hips and looked up at him with a scowl. “What the hell happened to him, Marco?” she muttered in quiet Italian.

“His father got very angry and hit him,” he said back, instinctively whispering, forgetting that Jean probably couldn’t understand anything they were saying. “He found out that he was --” Maco paused, forgetting the word for it in Italian, before sighing in frustration and saying it in English anyway. “ _Transgender_. Jean -- it’s just a -- type of ‘gay,’ I guess,” He waved his hands in the air, reverting back to English for a second. “You know, that LGBT-plus thing I was talking about.”

Marcia waved at him as well and swatted him on the shoulder. “Get on with it, I’m not completely incompetent.”

Marco shrugged. “ I don’t know how to explain it well. His father is just very against it.”

Marcia nodded, not needing any further an explanation to understand the gist of it. “So it is not safe for him to be home?” she asked, in Italian again.

Marco nodded. “Very not-safe. I want him to be here for a while, at least until he can start to live with another relative.”

“And you care for him?”

Marco paused. She had used the word _affeto_ , for “adore” instead of _volere bene_ , for care or casual affection. He didn’t know how to respond in Italian. In English, the answer would be yes, he held care for him, but in Italian...there were more types of love than one could describe with words in English. Words that didn’t have meanings in both languages. Words that held more weight than their translations.

“I want him to be okay,” Marco whispered in English.

With a knowing nod, Marcia swatted him on the hip. “Go, _Caro,_ get the boy his mattress. I trust you to be careful.”

Blushing profusely, Marco did as he was told.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Take them off.”

Jean had finished his food (read: he had eaten a few bites of everything and had managed to convince Marcia it was enough), and had walked up to Marco’s bedroom per instructions from his mother, and had entered to find him resting on his bed with a beaten up laptop on his lap.

He blushed hard, his bruise turning an ugly dark purple, frowned, and took a step backwards. “Excuse me?” he asked, put off and confused.

Marco looked away as well, concealing the red on his own cheeks. “The bandages. I know you’re wearing them. Take them off. They can hurt your lungs, mess up your internal organs. You know that. So take them off, and give them to me. I don’t want you to be wearing them.”

Jean sighed, reaching up at his sides underneath his sweatshirt, and unraveled the layers of cloth, ace bandages curling around his chest and falling down to the curve of his hips. “I know what they do, but...I needed to. Just for the day. My dad -- he caught me binding and -- well, you know what happened.”

“Was that why?” Marco asked gently.

Jean frowned at him, and he realized the sentence had slipped out as half-Italian.

“Sorry, force of habit.” he mumbled, embarrassed. “I asked if that was why. He caught you binding?”

“Kind of.”

That ‘Kind of’ was weighted, but Marco ignored it. He gave Jean the benefit of the doubt and nodded, closing his laptop. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, making sure that it was in Italian again.

Jean smirked at him, hunching forward and sitting next to him on his bed. Marco tried to ignore how his sternum was concave, how he hunched forward painfully, how his breaths got immediately easier when he took the binding from his chest -- Jean crossed his arms over his sweatshirt and looked away. “What am I supposed to wear to school?” he asked quietly. “I can’t just go freeballing, it would make things even more dangerous.” His eyes went wide, and he glanced sideways at Marco. “Shit, how am I going to pee? There are no gender-neutral restrooms anywhere near my classes… _shit,_ ”

Marco smiled at him. “Do you want to listen to my ‘calm-down’ mix tape?”

Jean chuckled, arms tightening around his middle. “Yeah. Yeah, I would. Thanks, Marco.”

“Good.”

The warm, uncertain feeling overwhelmed him, confused him, but he knew one thing for certain -- things were going to turn out okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah. Listen to the music I like. I am bilingual (well, tri, but im not fluent in any language except for petty) so I was speaking from own experiences with the language barriers and how there are words with different meanings, but I don't speak Italian. If you have a better way of saying what I was trying to convey please comment/message me on tumblr! I'm sorry if this is totally rude lmao.  
> goodbye lovely people.


	5. Sylvia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This gets a bit dark, but there's some fluff if you squint.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> F word and d-slur are both used once in this chapter. Sorry for typing the d slur when I am technically male and have never had it used against me as an afab trans person, but I sacrificed some of my fem ally points for the sake of the creative effect. I love you all. 
> 
> also, panicking and anxiety are going to be heavy in this fic, as well as dysphoria -- although dysphoria will begin to dwindle as Jean starts his recovery process. Get well everyone and if you ever need to talk my tumblr blog is a Safe Space. My new url is the-mega-trans-sjw. check me out.

When the rest of Marco’s family arrived later that night, they were surprised to find that there had been a recent addition to their home. His two younger sisters, Elena and Valentina, both middle schoolers, were extremely excited to have a new person at the dinner table. Luca, Marco’s youngest sibling, seemed a bit put off. His first thought was to ask Marcia if the “new boy” was going to take his spot at the dinner table.

Marcia, and Marco’s father, Alberto, were immediately assuring him that no, Jean would not be taking any of his things, and yes, he was friendly.

Jean was mesmerized by how similar they looked to each other. Besides Marco’s father, who was distinctly hispanic and much darker than his children, they all had the same dark eyed, dark haired, olive skinned looks. He didn’t really look like any of his family -- he had dyed his hair tawny just to make up for how much he _did_ look like his dad with short brown hair, and his mom and him had nothing alike, besides maybe how their eyes were shaped, but even them, hers were dark brown, and his were closer to caramel in shade.

Not only did they all look alike, but they all worked together like one unit. Ymir and Marco immediately picked up the slack when their younger siblings failed to clean up after themselves, their parents speaking with small glances shot around young heads. It was nice, seeing them work like...well, like a family. Jean couldn’t be too sure how that was, considering he hadn’t really been apart of one for five years.

He was staring in wonder, when suddenly, Marco was at his shoulder. He pushed him forward towards the make-shift dinner table. It appeared to be able to fit five, but while there were eight of them, things didn’t really work out the way they were planned.

Jean sat down on the spare foldable chair from a closet near by, Marco splitting half of a step ladder with his little brother Luca. The rest of the family was stuffed elbow to elbow around the circular plane.

The space was limited, but the food -- the food was amazing. Jean hadn’t had such a meal at home in years.

Ymir shot him a confused look as he began to eat very quickly. “Hey, new kid, you’ve got time, you know.”

Jean looked down at the bowl, embarrassed. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “Force of habit. We don’t really have family meals back at ho -- at my house.”

Marco gave him a sad look. He nudged his elbow with his own, and shot him a bright smile. “Eat however you want, Jean.”

Blushing, he nodded and tucked in, albeit a bit slower this time.

Dinner was loud.

The children were all fighting to tell Marcia and Alberto about their day first, some of them jabbering in Italian, others in spanish. Marco chuckled when Luca muttered something next to him in another language that Jean didn’t understand. He smiled, anyway, enjoying the lack of awkward silence that was often a problem among his old meals at his home. _Not your home,_ a dark voice hissed at him from the inside of his head.

Jean couldn’t help but think the voice was right. How could it not be? He wasn’t welcome there anymore. His dad had said so -- “Don’t come home from school until you come home as my daughter.”

“But I’m _not_ , dad!” he had cried back, terror striking through him. “I can’t do that!”

“Then you aren’t my child,” he had hissed back.

Jean winced, shaking his head to clear it of the thoughts of the day and night before. He looked over at Marco and jostled his shoulder gently. “Hey,” he started.

“ _Que pasa?_ ”

Jean raised an eyebrow, and Marco realised that he had been speaking in another language and shook his head. “Sorry, bad habit. What’s up?”

With a small smile, Jean nodded towards his plate, where he had eaten half of his meal. The kids were all finished -- surprising, considering Marcia had ladened all of their plates with roast beef, spanish rice, and apple slices (an odd combination, but surprisingly tasty together). He tilted his head at Marco. “Is it okay if I go up? It’s a bit….” _stressful? frantic?_ “...loud.”

Marco smiled and nodded, eyes falling closed a bit as he took Jean’s plate and spooned the beef -- which Jean hadn’t touched, of course -- and apples onto Luca’s plate. “Yeah, you go on ahead. I’ll be up in a little bit, just let me help mom with the kids.”

Jean knew that meant he would be cleaning up after them, and for a moment felt bad about not helping him out, but just nodded and pushed the foldable chair out from underneath him.

He climbed up the stairs and made it to Marco’s room. Once he was alone, he realized how fast his breathing had become.

His chest stuttered, breath coming out rapidly and shallowly from his bruised lungs, mouth trying desperately to suck air back in. He felt like there was sand -- sand was filling his lungs, he couldn’t see, he couldn’t breathe, he didn’t know how to make it _stop_ he just wanted it to stop --

Jean’s dad rained down on him, screaming and yelling unwarranted out of nowhere. He had been getting changed, pulling on one of the shirts he had borrowed from Marco over his only binder, when his door had cracked open. He knew he should have locked it -- he normally did, and had thought about it, but decided he didn’t need to -- it was his fault. He didn’t lock the door and now his dad was trying to kill him.

At least, that’s what it feels like when your own parent his hitting and screaming at you.

Jean had cried, screaming back at his dad to stop when he yanked at his binder under his shirt and snapped the metal clips on the sides. He felt like he was drowning.

Right now, he felt like he was drowning. Water was filling his nose, clogging his pores, filling him, completely covering him until he couldn’t even think besides escape, get away, you need to _get away,_ and he was clutching his head and nearly ripping out his hair.

And then it was over. The wheezing stopped, and he could see, finally, breathe.

Jean was on his knees on the mattress in Marco’s room. He couldn’t really remember why he was there.

Suddenly, someone knocked on the door and he felt his heart jump out of his chest again.

“Hey, John -- or, _Jean,_. or however you pronounce it...uh, I noticed you might...need something?”

Jean frowned. “What do you…” he saw the slightly nervous look on her face, how she was holding her hands near her chest and gesturing vaguely, and realized what she was talking about. “Oh, uh...yeah.”

Ymir smiled sheepishly and nodded backwards towards the doorway. “C’mon. I’ll show you my lair.”

Jean scrambled to his feet to follow her, tripping slightly over the edge of the mattress under his feet, and jogged out of the room after her. She led him up another, shorter set of stairs into the attic.

“So you don’t…” he started, unable to find the words. “You don’t care?”

Ymir snorted. “You thought Marco’s gay sister would care his friend was trans? Yeah, okay.”

Jean looked up at her with wonder. _Well, when you put it like that..._

He stepped into the attic, and found while the floor was neat and things were put away on shelves lining one wall, the walls themselves were cluttered with various posters of bands and famous women. Jean smiled. Light filtered through small windows at the very top of the walls. The ceiling was slanted, low to the floor, and the bed was pressed up inside a small nook in one of the walls. It really did look a bit like a lair.

He looked around at the posters before he realized Ymir was staring at him with a curious look on her face. Well, not him, per say, but his chest. He quickly crossed his arms and looked away, face staining red.

“Oh, don’t do that,” Ymir complained, before she started to rummage around in her top dresser drawer. “I need to know they’ll fit you. I’m pretty sure they will, but --” she pulled out two running sports bras from her drawer. “Here. Try these on in the bathroom and tell me if they fit, or if we should just run to the store tonight and get you a nice one.”

Jean shook his head vigorously. “No, you don’t need to buy anything for me!” 

With a roll of her eyes, she tossed the two items at his midsection. “Then make sure you fit these two, dumbass.”

He left the room and found the bathroom adjacent to Marco’s bedroom, and quickly slipped off his old sweatshirt. His shirt followed suit. Jean made sure to turn away from the mirror with a wince. He really didn’t need to be looking at himself, especially after -- what just happened. He tugged the sports bra on over his head and shoulders and pulled the second one on over it. Thankfully, they both fit like that. The straps were a bit loose, as Ymir was much taller than him, but after layering them on top of each other they fit just fine. He tugged his shirt back on and looked at himself from the side.

Of course, doubling up on sports bras didn’t work as well as an actual binder, but he could breath well and nothing hurt. His chest was flat enough to pass as well as he normally would -- with a jacket, or an open flannel over the shirt he would look even flatter. From the front you could barely see any difference. Jean managed a weak smile at himself, before he threw the hoodie on over his shoulders and went back to let Ymir know.

She took one look at him, smiled, and nodded. “That’ll do well, for now.”

“For now?” Jean asked weakly, but she was already pushing him out of the room.

“Yep! You look great! Now go to bed, you still have to go to school tomorrow.”

With a sigh, Jean left her alone and made his way back to Marco’s room.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next morning, he woke up with a shake to the shoulder. “Hey, hey Jean, you have to get up early.”

“Don’t...wanna,” he murmured sleepily, turning over and curling into himself. His face was throbbing with a low burn. Not only that, but his whole back and rib cage positively ached. _That’s what you get for using ACE bandages,_ he told himself. He cracked open one eye and looked at Marco. “Why are we getting up this early?”

“Well,” Marco started. He was rubbing at the back of his neck sheepishly. “You still need things to wear, and none of our clothes are going to fit you. I was going to see if you were up to driving back to your old house and getting some of your things. I’ll go with you, of course. Do you think…” _Do you think your dad will be home?_

“No,” Jean answered him before he could complete the sentence. “He shouldn’t be home. Not now, he leaves for work pretty early in the morning. If we’re lucky, neither of them will be there.”

Marco nodded. “Alright then. Well, get up. Mom’s starting on breakfast now, by the time we’ll get back it will be ready. We can eat while we get ready for school.”

Jean brought himself downstairs and into Marco’s truck before he even knew what he was doing.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At some point on the ride there, Jean became fully awake and found his heart pounding at his chest, as if it were trying to escape and fly away. _I’m actually doing this,_ he thought. The thought terrified him. He didn’t want to, he didn’t want to go back there, it was not his home, Marco was his home -- 

And then Jean realized he had been referring to Marco, not his house or his family, as his home, and that scared him even more.

“Hey,” Marco muttered, sensing his breathing picking up in speed and the stilling of his fidgeting. “You’re going to be safe. I’m going to be here for you, remember?”

“Could you play _The Antlers_ again?” Jean asked quietly, looking out the window.

Smiling, Marco hit play on the cassette dashboard. The tape was already there, and began to play the beginning chords of guitar and banjo. Jean let out an even breath and tipped his head back. “I can do this,” he muttered.

A few of the first songs went by, and Jean started to tap his fingers again, his hand beating out the tune of the opening to one of their more aggressive songs.

“You can do this.”

“ _I_ can do this.”

“You can do it.”

“I can _do this._ ” Jean said. “That’s it. We’re doing it. We’re going to fucking do it.”

Marco opened the window as far down as it could go, and when the intense bit of the song started to pick up, he opened his mouth and out right shouted. “ _Sylvia!_ ” he screamed. “Won’t you come out in the open!”

They were both laughing at this, screaming at the top of their lungs with the music turned up to such an incredibly loud volume it hurt their ears, but they didn’t care.

“I can do it,” Jean said. The music was so loud that Marco couldn’t even hear him, but it didn’t matter.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jean’s dad wasn’t there. His mom wasn’t there. The house was empty, and nothing had changed, as if he hadn’t even left at all. It hurt -- his heart hurt, standing there, knowing no one was there and that they were going to be able to carry on without him just fine. _They didn’t love him._ Jean couldn’t help but think it. How could they? How could they possibly love him if they were able to do this to him?

He shook his head, and focused on shoving the clothing into his emptied school bag. Silence crashed down around him. He was sitting in his room just like he had been the day before when… _it_ had happened. Jean remembered waking up in a concussed stupor afterwards only to hear his father on the phone, yelling at the principle of his school. Calling him a girl. Calling him a dyke. Telling the principle that he shouldn’t be allowed to act the way he did at school, that people shouldn’t be allowed to respect his name or pronouns, that he was his daughter and his name was Elizabeth Miranda and he was a Real Girl and he was -- 

And he was suddenly unable to see straight.

He could vaguely hear Marco asking him in a concerned voice if he was going to be okay, but he was too busy trying to shove everything in the bag and zip it up, as if he were hiding it away, as if he could do so.

They made it back to the truck. Surprisingly, Jean did not cry. He just stared forward, unseeing, clutching the bag of clothing to his chest like a lifeline.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a q...do you guys think there should be smut near the end of this fic? Just wondering. Also you should definitely look at the songs I mention in the chapters and at the chapter titles, they are seriously very good.


	6. Shhh!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Shhh!" by The Antlers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bit of angst plus plot. don't worry, shippy stuff happens next chapter.
> 
> tw for abuse, sexual harassment, misgendering, the works

Jean managed to make it to class without Marco’s help that day.

It was a difficult accomplishment, of sorts, but Jean knew he was going to have to do it on his own eventually, so he decided he’d just go ahead and do it without any lag. The thought process made logical sense in his mind. It should have been easy. In reality, however, things were a bit more complicated.

Jean knew he passed enough for teachers to regard him as male, even if there was no “Jean” on the roster. They had always thought of him as such -- he didn’t talk enough in class for them to need to know his name to call on him. He always did things in groups with the other boys, even used the boys bathrooms and changing rooms for his weight training class. All in all, if he was completely cautious in everything he did at school, things went pretty well for him.

As soon as he got back after his dad had called every _one_ of his teachers, things changed. The students stared at him as he rushed through the hallway, ignoring his locker and tried to make it to his first period class in the hopes that it would be empty this early in the morning.

The classroom wasn’t empty.

He rushed inside, backpack shouldered with both hands gripping it protectively, and froze.

Inside, were seven boys. Jean recognized three of them from weight training -- they were football players. The other four looked just as menacing. They were huddled around one another, sitting in a circle on top of the dess in the middle of the classroom.

Jean quickly looked away from them and made for the back of the classroom, where his seat was, when he heard them muttering to themselves.

“Yeah, My girlfriend is a TA for this teacher, it has first period in this class,” one of them mumbled.

“Why are we here so early?”

“We don’t want everyone else to be here when it -- oh shit, is that it?”

_It._ Jean gritted his teeth. _They called me it._

One of the boys flung an arm out and blocked his path, looking over him with raised eyebrows. “Hey,” he grinned. “What’s your name?”

_Shit shit shit shit shit…_ “Er, Jean.” he muttered under his breath. _Really, Kirstein? Couldn’t even come up with a different name?_

One of the players smirked and stood up, cracking his knuckles loudly.

“Yeah, but what’s your _real_ name?” he asked.

Jean cringed backwards, hips hitting a row of desks -- he was trapped. “That is my real name.” He cursed himself at how high pitched his voice sounded when he got nervous.

“Can’t be. It’s a boys name, no one named you that. You gave it to yourself, fucking tranny.” one of them snarled.

He flinched again, leaning backwards as the first boy stepped up to him and pinned him against the desks with his thighs against his hips. “Don’t -- don’t call me that,” he mumbled, tongue heavy in his mouth, voice pitching upward in fear.

“Why the fuck not? It’s true, isn’t it?”

Jean shook his head as the boy grabbed for his jaw and held him still. “Let me go,” he said, trying to make his words deeper and powerful. They came out in a pitiful whimper instead.

The boys laughed, rowdily pushing at each other as they stepped forward and leered at him.

“Sorry, we didn’t mean to hurt a girl,”

“Please, it’s not really a girl. Hey Liz, have you had the surgery, or is everything still the same down there?”

“Yeah, I think it has, its chest is pretty flat.”

Jean winced and flailed backwards as one of the boys slipped a hand under the hem of his t-shirt and groped at his chest, bound only by the two sports bras Ymir had given him. “Nope, it’s still a girl up here!” one of the boys chuckled, squeezing with both hands in a way that was so painful Jean bit his tongue to keep from crying out.

“C’mon, man, lemme have a go,” one of them muttered, and the boy trapping him against the desk switched out with another, sliding his hands out along his soft stomach. He pinched his sides, before the other was shoving his shirt up to his collarbones and trapping it there. The other boys whistled and hollered obscenities, groping him messily and leering at him.

“Stop, don’t -- don’t touch me,” Jean hissed. He grabbed at their hands and forced them away from his torso, balling them up in his loose shirt and tugging it down to cover himself. “Get off of me, I’m serious!” he growled. His voice wasn’t getting any louder, even as he tried to force it to do so. The boys were just laughing at him -- not even making any effort to to be quiet. They were doing the work for him. “Let _go_!”

“Just what exactly is going on in here?”

Everyone froze, including Jean. The door to the classroom slammed open, and there stood their teacher -- she had both hands on her hips, staring them down over her glasses.

The boys shoved away from Jean and tucked their hand into their pockets. “Sorry ma’am, we were just giving her a hard time.”

She raised an eyebrow and lowered her eyes. The boy pinning him against the desk stepped backwards awkwardly.

“Is that true, Miss Kirstein?” the teacher asked.

Cringing internally, Jean shot the boys a glance and received a threatening glare back. He hesitated, nodding at the woman, who huffed and turned away. “Get to class, then. I don’t want to see you boys hassling her anymore.”

They shuffled out of the room, shoulders jostling his as they exited.

When they were alone together, Jean huffed out a small, “It’s ‘he,’ actually.”

“I’m aware.” Ms. Hannes murmured. “Your father called the school. He’s threatening to sue if we don’t call you as what you were born.”

She didn’t seem to upset about this, only put off by the fact that Jean was still in the room, still trying to talk to her. Jean furrowed his brows.

“I wasn’t ‘born’ anything besides this.” he muttered.

She just shrugged, unaffected. “If you’re going to come in my class early you could at least sit in your seat.” She sat at her desk and looked at him once more from above her glasses. “Oh, and I was supposed to let you know -- if you try to start using the men’s restrooms again, we might have to revoke your bathroom privileges altogether.”

Defeated, Jean just nodded and sat down in the back of class as he always did and waited.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

He ended up waiting out the whole day. It was shitty, that’s for sure, but he managed to grit his teeth and bite his nails until he was meeting Marco at his truck.

Marco gave him a sad smile, but it was a weak one. Jean didn’t blame him. He didn’t think he’d be able to muster up more than a small grimace, at this point.

There was an air about him that made Marco loop an arm around him immediately and pull him into a tight, fleeting hug before unlocking his beat up old Ford and guiding him inside.

“Spill,” he muttered, cranking the truck into gear.

Jean sighed, tugged his knees up in front of him and rested his nose in between them.

“A couple of guys found me in first period and started messing around. Not much besides that. Misgendering all day, my teachers aren’t allowed to call me by my name or pronouns, and I’m not allowed to use the bathroom at school anymore. I’m thinking of dropping weight training if I have to.”

Marco cringed. “That doesn’t sound like ‘not much,’ that sounds like absolute shit.”

Jean chuckled darkly. “Can you turn on the music?”

With a frown, Marco did as told and eased the car out of the parking lot and onto the back roads that led to the Bodt house. Jean focused on the ride -- until the path began to change, and he didn’t recognize where they were going.

“Where are we --”

“You’ll see,” Marco murmured. “Can you eat ice cream?”

“I don’t care, I’ll do it anyway.”

“Good.” He sighed. “We damn well deserve it.”

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Marco drove him to the closest frozen yogurt shopee, and Jean busted out his dad’s credit card. It hadn’t been dropped yet -- thank goodness -- but Jean wanted to make the most of it while it lasted. He planned on using it to buy a couple binders online before his dad realized and revoked it. Normally he had an allowance, but he wasn’t living with them anymore, and the card was directly connected to his account, so...Jean decided he might as well use the money to milk his dad for everything he deserved since being punched in the face.

Three black medium chest-compression vests couldn’t make up for the constant pangs of fear in his heart, but they would still make him happier.

Marco let him loose on the self serve yogurt dispensers.

Jean went to town.

There were so many flavors that he hadn’t been able to try before (why did coffee ice cream taste the way coffee smells, and not the way it tastes?), so he decided to just evenly section out the sixteen-ounce cardboard bowl and try every flavor with dairy in it.

Afterwards, Jean was happy.

Until he started throwing up into the toilet beside Marco’s bedroom, but even that didn’t deter him.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

His office was cold, but then again, so was he.

Mr. Kirstein was a cruel man. He had little care for his employees, nearly ignored the work standards of his state, and convinced employees to quit without doing anything illegal to them, just so he didn’t have to waste any of his ample amounts of money on them. He was a businessman, and a good one, by his own standards.

When he found out his child had used his money to buy terrible devices to mutilate her body in an attempt to look more like she was not, he simply shook his head. His fingers were typing before he even realized.

He sent two letters -- one to the Mayor’s office, partitioning for him to rethink the all-too friendly laws in the city, and the next to his daughter.

With a grin he sat back in his chair.

He knew he loved her -- she was his child. He had raised her. He had watched her grow up, though from afar, and he still held twisted fondness in his heart. He wanted his daughter back at home. And he wanted her to be _normal._ Not one of these deranged trendy children who made blogs on the internet about various ways to make their parents sad, he wanted his daughter. He wanted her wearing dresses, apologizing for smearing his reputation like this. He wanted so many things.

But first, he needed to make her understand.

If she wanted to be like this, she was going to have to face how cruel the world really can be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im so sorry  
> I love you


	7. Philadelphia Don't You Haunt Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I'm scared my hair will always kill me in the end/My friends oh know, my friends I'm fucking scared of losing them/And I, I, I, know that I'll never be a tough guy"  
> \--"Tough guy", Cyber bully mom club

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of angst but lots of relationship development

“Are you drunk or something?”

Jean leaned back on his heels, wiping at his mouth with the back of his hands before flushing the toilet. He looked up at the doorway -- Ymir stood there with an eyebrow raised suggestively.

“Because really, I won’t judge you for getting drunk after school, but you could at least hold back a little.”

“I’m not drunk,” he murmured, looping his arms over his stomach. “I haven’t eaten dairy in years. We just got frozen yogurt.”

Ymir sucked in a breath through her teeth. “That sounds terrible.”

“It is. But it was worth it.” he muttered wistfully. He didn’t know about _that,_ but the yogurt was amazing.

With a heavy sigh, Ymir walked over to him and nudged his side with her knee. “Do you think you’re done puking?”

“Yeah, I think it’s all out of my system.” Ymir reached her hand out, and Jean took it, pulled himself up and grimaced. “I feel disgusting.”

“Well, you just puked your guts up.”

He shook his head. “It’s not that,” he said, but didn’t explain. He turned away from Ymir and flicked the faucet handle of the sink so he could wash his hands, wash his mouth out with the water, and walked out of the bathroom. The yogurt was a nice surprise, but he still felt disgusting. He felt used, like an item for someone else’s entertainment. Shaking his head once more, he wandered into Marco’s room and plopped down on the mattress.

Marco was there, lying back on his bed with a textbook splayed across his chest, but he didn’t say anything when Jean walked in. He pushed his glasses up his nose, gave him a meaningful look, and left it at that.

Jean nodded and pulled the blankets around him. He wasn’t sure just when he fell asleep.

He woke up to a dark, silent room, perforated only by the quiet sound of Marco’s breathing. He turned over onto his back and stared up at the ceiling. The lights were off, Marco’s textbooks and backpack rested on the floor beside his mattress. Feeling a strange urge to get energy out of his system, Jean pulled himself into a sitting and then standing position. He peered over at Marco. He had fallen asleep with his reading glasses on, his back pressed against the wall uncomfortably with a paperback book in his hands.

Smirking, Jean leaned over his large form and plucked the frames from his nose. He folded them gently and placed them, along with the book, on his bedside table.

Marco looked so peaceful in sleep.

Not that he didn’t at all times, ever, but looking at him with his broad chest rising and falling slowly, the crease between his eyes gone, his lips drooping and relaxed, he looked -- Jean struggled to find the words for it. Young? No, he always looked like that. He always looked like he was either trying to infect everyone around him with happiness, big cheeky grin on his face, or he was just not taking any of your shit.

Either way, right now, he looked incredibly… _cute,_ Jean thought. He felt his ears heat up and he immediately looked away. There was no reason to think like that. Marco wouldn’t think of him like not, especially not after finding out about him. He said it himself. Jean would have called anyone else out for saying something so transphobic, but after he apologized, Jean had just tossed the thought over his shoulder and ignored it. But now....he had a strange, unexplainable urge to just lean over and kiss him on the forehead. He wanted to touch him. And that scared him.

Jean quickly scrambled away from the bed and fell down on his own, wrapped the blankets around them and buried his nose in his sleeve-covered hands to hide the blush on his cheeks. He groaned into his hands and squeezed his eyes shut. _No, Jean. You will_ not. _He’s too good for you, and he won’t like you, no matter how nice he is._

With a quiet sigh, Jean forced himself to go back to sleep. His dreams were invisibly painful. He endured until morning.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For whatever reason, the memory of his own thoughts from the night before caused Jean to be incredibly salty the next day.

He brushed Marco’s sympathy off and got ready completely by himself, bypassed a homemade breakfast au la Bodt and made himself a piece of toast instead. He was nearly silent on the way home. He pushed one of Marco’s many cassettes into the slot and was happy to hear that it was only songs by Cyberbully Mom Club. With a relaxed expression, he nodded his head to the songs and enjoyed them as they faded into each other. When they got to school he nodded back to Marco and left him for his classes.

School passed in a terrible blur.

His teacher’s still refused to support him. They refused to protect him. They refused to even listen to him.

He wanted to use the men’s bathrooms anyway, just to spite them, but he knew he couldn’t. Even if Obama made it legal for him to use whatever bathroom he wanted to on school campus, he neither had the money or the means to protect his rights without his parents supporting him. The whole ordeal was just a mess.

In math class -- his last period - he was surprised with a buzz in his pocket. With a shock, Jean peered down at his phone.

A fluorescent _Mom_ blinked back at him hauntingly. His breath caught in his throat and he could have sworn his heart stopped.

_Why is she calling me?_ he thought, panic flowing through him. He didn’t think she would ever try to reach out to him, not if she was married to That Man. He didn’t even know if he _wanted_ her to talk to him.

He waited for what felt like hours, staring down at the phone screen as it buzzed silently in his hand. He couldn’t even muster up the proper thought to debate whether or not he should answer, just stared.

Jean felt a tap on his shoulder, and stared up at the cause. His teacher was standing there, an eyebrow rose. “No phones in class, Elizabeth.” he said softly. With shaking hands, Jean clicked _end call_ and stuffed the phone in his pocket.

He spent the last few minutes of class drawing his real name on his wrist with a pen until he felt like the ink had soaked through. If only it could -- just stay there, permanently, stuck in his skin on his hands. Always there, like proof. That was him. Not Elizabeth, but Jean Anthony Kirstein. Jean Anthony Kirstein. Over and over again, in swirling ink. Jean Jean Jean Jean Jean Jean Jean Jean Jean.

If only he could get the swirling pit of emotion in his chest to agree with him.

When he got back into Marco’s truck, he didn’t say anything. This time, however, it wasn’t on purpose. He just stared ahead at nothing and contemplated why exactly his mother was trying to call him.

Marco wasn’t having it.

“Did I do something?” he asked, a bit loudly, with so much emotion in his voice it shocked Jean. He didn’t realize he was hurting him, but it was completely evident in his voice.

“No, not really,” he murmured, pulling his knees up to his chest. “I mean -- it’s nothing.”

“Come on, Jean, you have to tell me. I want to know so I can make up for it.”

“It’s nothing.” He clicked the play button on the dashboard and soft ukulele flitted out through the speakers.

Marco slammed his hand down on the same button and paused the music. “Bullshit.”

“I’m not ling to you,”

“And I don’t believe you.”

Jean opened his mouth with a retort, but it evaporated from his tongue and sighed heavily. “Sorry.” he muttered. “It’s just something that I have to get through on my own. You wouldn’t understand.”

He was expecting this to be a resolution, but Marco’s face just fell and he griped the steering wheel even harder. The music played once more, and the truck swerved from their parking spot. They drove home, in silence once more, Jean left quietly wondering if _he_ was the one doing things wrong.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Marco didn’t know what to do.

It was one of his worst fears, happening just before him, and the whole point of it was that he couldn’t stop it from happening. He felt like he was losing a friend -- and that same friend wasn’t letting him know what he could do to keep that from happening. The minute those words left Jean’s mouth he felt his heart skip a beat. _You wouldn’t understand,_ of course he wouldn’t understand. He never does, does he? He’s just Happy Bodt, here with a smile. He didn’t actually do anything. It was his own fault this was happening, that Jean was shutting him out, he just wasn’t sure why.

There were a couple possible reasons.

He had said something, and Jean was either to scared or too angry to tell him.

Or, he hadn’t done anything at all. And that was the problem. Jean didn’t trust him enough to share his feelings with him. He was either to nervous or scared, and didn’t think Marco would be able to understand.

And because of this, Marco felt as though he was failing his friend.

He parked his truck in front of his house and Jean hopped out, walking up to the front of the house without turning to look at him. Marco noticed a flash of dark on the inside of his wrist and squinted. It was quickly covered by the sleeve of his sweater, but there was something there. Jean wore protective clothing, Marco knew that -- he doubled up on sports bras, which wasn’t the best thing, but was definitely better than bandages or tape, and he always wore baggy shirts and layers paired with tight pants or sweats that tapered at the calves to cover the shape of his hips.

Marco wondered if he even knew how skinny he was, or if he thought that his slightly wider hips were completely blatant if he were to wear anything else.

He tore his eyes from his ass, wondering exactly _why_ he was staring at Jean’s hips when he was a _friend_ and probably off limits, and got out of his truck himself.

He immediately found his mom in the kitchen and gave her a very pointed look. She did a double take at his expression, before going along with it and letting him lead her into her bedroom.

“What’s wrong, _tesoro_?” she asked softly.

Marco buried his face in her bed and fell back into Italian. “I don’t know what to do, mama!”

She chuckled softly and ruffled the undercut at the back of his head. “Talk to me, sweetheart.”

He sighed deeply. “I just -- I think he’s angry at me? But he he won’t tell me if he really is! How am I supposed to make things better if I don’t know what I did?”

“You’re not.”

“Exactly!” He leaned up and threw his hands in the air. “I just don’t know how I’m supposed to stay close to him if he doesn’t trust me with that.”

His mother sucked a breath in through her teeth. “I don’t now. Maybe he just needs time. I’m sure he won’t actually pull away from you, no one could, you’re too sweet. Just give him time and let him figure things out for himself, and make sure to let him know that he can trust you.”

Marco looked down at the quilt that covered his parent’s bed. He just didn’t know if he could show Jean that he was trustworthy if Jean might not think of anyone as trustworthy. Either way, he gave his mother as realistic a tight-lipped smile he could muster, and stood up from the bed to pull her into a hug. She was a good head shorter than him, so his broad arms and large biceps almost completely enveloped her. “Thank you, ma,” he murmured into the crown of her head. She squeezed him back and he hoped desperately that she was right.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When Marco walked back into his room and found Jean standing there, he didn’t know how to react except smile at him.

Jean’s brows were drawn together in the center, and he gave Marco an almost desperate look. “Did you mean it?” he asked, biting his lip nervously.

Marco paused. “What do you mean? Did I mean what?”

“When we were in the barbershop. Did you mean it? You said you were a gay guy because you hated vagina. Is that -- is it true?” his voice dropped slightly in pitch. “Is that how cis gay guys are? Do they all -- do they all not like trans boys? Because that doesn’t make sense to me. I -- I don’t like to think of it like that. And I need to know if it’s true because it really hurts to think that the only way a guy would like me is if he was also into girls. Because I’m not one.” he blurted out, the words crowding on his tongue and falling out among them in a hurry.

Marco felt both like a weight was being lifted from his shoulders, and like a few barbells were being tied around his but at the same time.

Oh.

So this is what this is about.

A matter of self conscious self depreciation and worry, paired with reasonable blame. Marco sighed.

“What? What was that sigh for?” Jean asked, his tone biting. His arms were looped around his stomach, something Marco noticed he did when he was feeling either nervous or self conscious.

“No,” he breathed.

“No? To what?”

“I didn’t mean it.” Marco said. “And it’s not true. I mean, I couldn’t tell that you were trans, so how would I know if I wasn’t attracted to trans people? It just doesn’t make sense. If I can’t tell who’s trans and who’s not then saying all gay guys are only attracted to boys who aren’t trans just...it couldn’t be right. And if there are gay boys who won’t date you even if you’re adorable then they’re assholes who you don’t need. But I’m not an asshole.”

A rush of air left Jean’s nose, and his shoulders slumped forward. “Thank you,” he murmured.

He turned away and fell backwards against his mattress.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jean buried his nose in his pillow again, heart thumping incredibly fast, butterflies floating around in his stomach. _He called me adorable,_ he thought to himself, the thought making his cheeks heating up to a bright pink.

_He thinks I’m adorable._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow me on tumblr for more mess: the-mega-trans-sjw. Also, to my readers who were worried -- yes, I'm trans, and yes, I live in North Carolina, but I'm safe and passing and I will be safe. Thank you for being concerned.
> 
> Also, sorry this was so late. It's been two weeks? Yikes, I'm going to be finishing this up in the next few weeks bc I'm going to be in Japan this summer and I don't want to have to be on hiatus for that long. But I know exactly where I'm going and what's going to be at the end of this. Thank for reading, frineds.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Read along my lovelies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im so fricken proud of this chapter

Marco just couldn’t fall asleep.

His heart was pounding too hard for him to even consider it -- he definitely wouldn’t be able to calm himself down anytime soon. Instead, he forced himself to breathe slowly. In and out, in and out, until he noticed the silence in the room wasn’t deafening anymore. The rush of blood in his ears cleared enough for him to hear Jean’s breathing as well. _He must be asleep,_ Marco thought. He let out a sigh of relief.

Sitting up in bed, he brought his hands to his face and bit down on the fleshy part of his palm. This wasn’t anxiety anymore -- it was...something else.

_Well, that was anticlimactic,_ he thought ruefully, before groaning in frustration. Stupid self. Stupid hormones, stupid body, stupid, _stupid_ Jean and his nice skin and low voice and Marco definitely shouldn’t be angry at him for those things, but he was.

(or, more like it, he was angry at himself.)

He couldn’t do it, he decided, already done with himself before eve figuring out exactly _why_ he should be done with himself.

He could maybe,

and take this with a few hefty handfuls of salt,

maybe, be slightly crushing on his friend-turned roommate.

Who was trans. And had intense emotional baggage. 

And definitely, for the life of him, deserved someone much better than Marco.

Not that the former should have mattered to him -- it definitely didn’t. Marco didn’t know he was trans and had thought he was attractive from the start, and he definitely wasn’t going to rule out such a huge category of boys just because they might in some cases look a little different from the rest of the boys.

_Quit calling him attractive, you absolute moldy pecan,_ he scolded himself, but thought so all the same.

He chalked it all down to just being too self-deprecating for his own good, and tried his best to ignore it.

It still took him a few hours to fall asleep that night, but when he did, it was deep, and one of the better sleeps he’s had in years.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next morning, a Friday, Marco fell from his own thoughts -- and his bed.

Jean snickered sleepily at him as he rubbed the sleep from his own eyes, grateful for the fact that his bed was on the ground, and that it couldn’t possibly happen to him. He met Marco’s tired eyes before avoiding them completely, which just sent Marco into more turmoil.

_His eyes...just the perfect color, like warm caramel…_ part of his brain whispered in the back of his head.

_STOP BEING SO HECKING GAY,_ the other part screamed.

He shook his head to remove the thoughts from his head, before he sighed, rubbing a hand roughly through his hair. It was messy, very messy, and that was a problem, because just like Jean, he was a hair snob. He grabbed a handful of cloth from his dresser before rushing into the bathroom.

“We can do it together, if you want,” Jean mumbled, sleep still in his voice, as well as a hint of amusement.

Marco sighed. “Do I have a choice?”

“Absolutely not. My hair looks like a rat made it its home overnight.”

“You always look like that, even when you fix it.”

“That’s nice, I’m still an _adorable_ rat’s nest though, aren’t I?”

With a roll of his eyes, Marco’s heart panged sharply. He had said that, hadn’t he? Had told Jean that he thought he was adorable? Was it too late to take that back? It wasn’t that he didn’t want Jean to know, but he didn’t want _himself_ to say it. He didn’t want to admit it.

If there was anything he hated, it was crushes. They never ended well, not fit Marco, not for anyone. They tied you down and confused me and they couldn’t result in anything and even if you knew that, your heart would still hurt. You would still ache after ruining the friendship.

He settled for combing his hair forward and then back, brushed the parted part up out of his face and sprayed it with hairspray as Jean stood behind him. He wet his hands before plucking at the front of his hair and pulling it up in front of his forehead and blowing it it with the blowdryer head on until it stood up in a puf above his head.

Marco didn’t admire the way the graceful slope of his neck connected to the back of his head, and he certainly didn’t imagine running fingers through the short hairs that were their, nor how fluffy and soft the dyed portion looked.

The school day was an emotional mess.

Marco couldn’t concentrate for the life of him -- he couldn’t pay attention in class, almost fell asleep daydreaming during third period, was caught gazing out the window with a contemplative expression during his fourth, and praised whatever heavenly being there was when the last bell rang and he could rush home.

When he met Jean at his truck, he looked defeated as usual.

Everytime he admitted this to himself his heart hurt. Jean looked so worn down at night, and only when in school and returning -- he could tell it was taking a toll on him, he _knew_ it was, but what could he do? Buy Jean his own house a few hours away so he could go to a different school?

No, it was preposterous. They would just have to wait it out, and hope for the best.

He sighed to himself, just as the metallic sound of Jean’s bag hitting the bucket of his trunk sounded against his chest. Jean threw open the door and hoisted himself up and into the cab.

“How was school?” Marco asked, but it was more of a novelty. He knew how school was.

Jean shrugged. “The same. As usual, I mean.”

With a knowing nod, Marco started the truck up and locked the doors. They didn’t speak much on the way back home, but Jean slotted his favorite tape into the cassette player and they hummed along to the music together -- Marco, of course, not knowing any of the words but catching onto the beat, and Jean belting out his favorite parts as loud as he wanted -- until they got to the house and out of the truck.

It was monotonous. Every day seemed to be, bleeding together and all the same, not getting better, not really getting worse, and Marco didn’t know how h felt about it. In a way, it was almost comforting. But he also hated it. He wanted desperately for things to get -- _something._ Something between them. His chest panged hard when he watched Jean wander away from him, around the house and into their back yard.

With another heavy sigh (Marco really needed to get out of the habit of sighing whenever he felt any sort of emotion) he hopped out of the truck as well and entered through the front door. He dropped his shoes and bag at the foot of the front door and made his way up into his room.

Whatever these emotions were, they were fucking exhausting.

When he got up to the second floor, Marco balked immediately. Music was coming in from the window just above his bed, and there could only be one source -- Ymir, or Jean, doing something incredibly dangerous.

He threw open the window and stuck his head out to see Jean sitting on the roof a level below him with buds in his ears and a sketchbook in his lap.

His hair flitted up in the wind. It was just short enough to spike up directly from his head in the most amazing unruly manner, and Marco suddenly had an intense urge to run his hands through it and grab at the back of his head before --

“Just what the hell are you doing?” he called down to him, zero contempt in his voice, but just enough panic for it to be embarrassing.

Jean looked up with surprise written across his face and plucked an earbud out. “I’m drawing?” He stated it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, like there was nothing wrong with what he was doing.

“That’s so dangerous,” Marco chided. “You could fall and break your back!”

With a roll of his eyes, Jean nodded towards the ground. “Then why don’t you come down here to make sure I don’t?”

A pause.

Marco sighed.

He looked up at the sky, as if to beg for forgiveness, and hoisted himself out of the window.

“Wait,” Jean called out, panicking. “I didn’t _mean_ it, you don’t have to, here, I’ll climb down --”

“No, don’t.” Marco muttered, shuffling down the first ridge of roofing and plopping down next to him with a hard thump.

Jean gives him this little smile from the side, and his breath stops for a second.

“What are you drawing?” he asks softly, instead of dying.

Jean looks down at his lap, where he was tracing a pencil sketch with a black ink pen. He shrugged. “I don’t know. I just kind of thought of it when I was in class and started drawing it. I guess I got a bit carried away.”

Marco peered at the book, and was taken aback. The drawing depicted a large cardboard box with mechanical arms and a robotic face and eyes, reaching out to another crumpled box below it with pincher-like fingers. The other box was torn open. Silhouetted black birds and bats were flying outwards and towards the corner of the page. It was a bit dark, sure, but certainly creative, and certainly with a talent for art.

“That’s -- really cool. A bit surreal, but --well, it looks like it would be the album cover for some underground indie band.”

Jean grinned up at him and dropped his pen by his side. “Wanna join my indie rock band?” he asked with a devilish glare in his eyes.

Marco smiled cheekily and looked down at his hands. The sound of plastic scraping against the roofing startled him.

“Oh, shit,” Jean muttered, grabbed downward for the pen, but the flannel he was sitting on slipped as well.

Marco didn’t know what he had done until after he had done it.

Jean had grabbed the pen when he started falling forward, away from him, and suddenly, Marco’s arms were around his waist and he was pinning him down against the roof tiles, knees tangled together, hands interlocking between them, the cap of the pen digging into Marco’s side and he was _so close_ and their noses were almost touching and his eyes shined so brightly, their hips were flush against each other and Marco couldn’t _breathe_ \--

Jean cut off his thoughts with a soft giggle, and Marco absolutely melted. He leaned back on his knees and looked as Jean’s hair fell around the tops of his eyebrows and ears. “Sorry for scaring you,” he said quietly.

With an internal shake of his head to clear his thoughts, Marco gave him a small grin. “I told you we should be careful.”

They lied back on the warm rooftop and braced their feet on the rough material, their heads closest to the walls of the house, shoulders brushing just enough to drive Marco insane, and watched as the afternoon sky started to flow into an inky black.

It was only when a loud buzz rang in Jean’s pocket that they spoke. Without hesitating, he ripped the cell phone from his pocket and gripped it in both hands, staring down at it with fear.  
“What?” Marco asked, concerned. “What’s wrong?”

“It --” he choked, and just showed the luminescent screen to him. Bright letters spelled out one word -- _Mother_.

“Are you going to answer it?” Marco pressed softly, and Jean stared at his shaking hands with sadness and fear in his eyes.

“I’m scared,” he whispered, looking down at the phone. He stared, frozen, just long enough for the ringing to stop and the call to be dropped. His shoulders dropped. Marco felt another, hard, warm pain fill his chest again at the sight and he wanted to lift those shoulders up again, to hold him, to make it stop hurting and _shit_ Marco loved him. He loved him so much it hurt.

It burned through his being so suddenly he almost choked. It wasn’t gradual at all -- and he hated to admit the cliche of it -- but it ran through him in an instant, all of the feeling crushing him like a weight that he enjoyed, a pain that was sickeningly sweet, like sugar poured into his veins. He felt like he was on a terrible high. And part of him hated it, of course, but the majority of him didn’t care if he got to be around Jean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/the-mega-trans-sjw/144361652776 is the pic that Jean was drawing. Hmu on tumbles my bumbles


	9. Heathens

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I'll bitchslap you slowly, down your throat, so the taste of it may linger" -- The front bottoms, "west Virginia." this quote doesn't have anything to do with this chapter I just think that line's hilarious and wanted to share it. Go listen to the Front Bottoms they're p great and hype.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the longest chapter yet so get ready ur welcome

If he was going to assure himself that he was definitely not creepy, and definitely didn’t like Marco, then _maybe_ watching him sleep wasn’t the best idea.

Jean sighed. It really wasn’t a big deal, was it? I mean, he could like him. Maybe. He said himself it was possible. He also blushed profusely when they had fallen all over each other on the roof.

_Or, he’s just disgusted by you and too much of a good person to tell you._

He shook his head at that. No need for negative thoughts, not now, not ever. He just needed to get over them. Jean turned away from where Marco was resting -- snoring lightly, his glasses resting in his outstretched hand, face lax and mouth parted slightly, so very much adorable -- and wandered off to the bathroom.

He studied his own face in the mirror for a moment. He had always been a bit self conscious. Behind the brazen smiles and snooty expressions, he still hated a lot of aspects about himself. Manly his chest and hips, but also how tall and gangly he was, the shape and length of his face, the way his head was shaped, how his hair never quite looked right, no matter how much he messed with it. His stomach was soft over muscle, while his arms were skinny and weak.

Not to mention he had a fading yellowish-green bruise underneath his eyes, and a scab over where his lip had broken, but that wasn’t the usual. Jean wasn’t ready for the bare contempt he felt when he saw it on his face, after what felt like weeks. _It’s your own fault for being disgusting,_ he thought to himself.

He just _had_ to be different, didn’t he? Had to be something outside of his parent’s vision. No, his _dad’s_ vision. His mom…

Jean looked down at his phone.

He wanted so desperately to talk to her. He wanted to call her and have a gross sobbing fit with her telling him it’d all be alright.

But he couldn’t.

What if she held the same views as his father? What if she just wanted to confirm, so she could berate him over the phone? What if she didn’t hate him, and just messed up, and Jean snapped?

There were too many variables, and yeah, he was nervous, hella nervous, but he still ached to hear her voice.

With a sigh, Jean backed away from the mirror and pulled his shirt over his head. He frowned a bit, turning to the side and slouching, trying to find a position that highlighted his chest the least, like usual. He knew he looked flat from the front in dark colored shirts, but from the side and above were different stories. He hated looking down at himself and seeing a very obvious swell just before his ribcage ended. Not only that, but he didn’t even have his binders yet, so wearing two sports bras at once without washing them was both unsanitary and uncomfortable.

Jean pulled the first and then second from his chest and tugged down his jeans and boxers. He avoided looking at himself in the mirror (except to check out his ass, because damn, even if his hips were unnecessary, being a gay guy with a butt was always helpful) and stepped into the shower before flicking the nobs to hot. He let the initial chill of the water wash over his sweaty skin until it began to heat up.

He showered quickly, and made up his mind. The next time his mother called he would answer. No acceptions, he would swipe and put the phone to his ear. Even if he had to hang up within the first few minutes of calling her it was important he was able to do so, just to get it off his chest, and to be able to make plans for the future.

After all, Jean couldn’t live with the Bodt’s forever.

(Even if he would be completely fine with that.)

Jean got into bed -- sparing one last look at Marco -- and closed his eyes, letting sleep finally take him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next day was hell.

All was going just fine, until he got a sudden and overwhelming urge to use the bathroom in third period. Jean grit his teeth painfully. There was no way this would end well. He couldn’t use the men’s room or he’d get in huge trouble, and he passed enough that using the women’s room was down right dangerous if anyone saw him, so either he could sneak outside during lunch and pee in the woods or risk getting beaten up. He balled up his fists. _I’m not even allowed to use the nurse’s bathroom,_ he remembered, internally seething.

He made up his mind about ten minutes later when class ended that he wasn’t going to let the school administrators give him a kidney infection, and dodged into the women’s restroom to pee.

Of course, Jean didn’t get a break. Inside, three girls already stood at the mirror -- one had probably been there for hours, her phone was plugged into an outlet and she was sitting on the floor watching something on the screen, her braids tucked behind her ears with a brightly colored bandana. Two others were fixing something about their appearances in the mirror. As soon as he walked in, they were staring at him.

He ducked his head low and ran into the first stall. As soon as he was out of sight, he forced a hand over his mouth and attempted to calm his breathing down. _It’s okay,_ he told himself. _You’re okay, just use the bathroom and get out and nothing will happen._

Jean hurried his ass up, grabbed his backpack back up from the floor and rushed out of the stall, washing his hands be damned, no matter how gross that sounded -- when suddenly he was crashing backwards into the closed door.

A burning pain already gripped his shoulders. Confusion hit him, and then he realized. _Someone just shoved me, run, run_ run!

Jean’s eyes darted everywhere.

Two boys stood in front of him, looks of horrid disgust curling their lips backwards like rabid dogs, leering over him. They backed him into the wall between two bathroom stalls. One of them, the boy in front, planted a hand against the door just beside his head and leaned so close he could feel his breath on his face.

“Just what the fuck are you doing in here?” he hissed, eyes narrowing.

Jean felt his throat close up. “I -- I’m not --”

“What’s wrong, can’t speak? You know this is _illegal,_ right?” He scoffed and turned away to look at his friend, as if to say _can you believe this guy?_

There was a dilemma. Jean didn’t want to get beaten up, but he didn’t want to go along with it, he couldn’t, they’d hurt him, he couldn’t breathe. His heart was in his stomach and throbbing painfully. Everything burned with the frantic instinct to just _run._

“I’m --”

The boy punched the wall beside his head. “You’re what? Some fucking tranny? In the bathroom with my girlfriend? At least fucking try to look like a chick, you’re just ugly. What, did you think no one was going to notice a boy running in here like you were so fucking eager you couldn’t wait?”

He shook his head violently. “I didn’t mean to! I don’t even like girls!”

“Yeah, alright champ, shut the fuck up.” The second boy pushed the other aside and took a handful of Jean’s sweatshirt in his fist and tugged him up onto his toes. “Don’t fucking do it again, okay? Or we’ll kill you. I swear to God I’ll kill you if you so much as _look_ at Kinsey.”

Jean nodded. “I won’t! Just --” he grabbed the hand holding him up. “Let me go, I can’t breathe.”

The first boy let out a sour laugh. “What the hell did you just say to him?” He grabbed Jean’s shoulder and shoved him backwards, but he’d had enough. Fight or flight, and he couldn’t run, and suddenly his knuckles were flying forward.

With surprise, he looked down at his hand. _Well, that hurt like hell._ He hadn’t realize that the face would be so bony.

It wasn’t until he was caught in the stomach by the boy’s knee that he regretted lashing out. It was two against one, and he was smaller, less muscular, and less confident, and they were already on him. The first grabbed his hair and shoved him to the floor while the other rolled up his sleeves so he could punch him easier. At the first blow, Jean grit his teeth and cried out into them. Fire erupted in his gut. It raged along his ribcage, burning, aching pain that started dull but got sharper with every breath he sucked in. Jean tried to grab at one of their ankles and pull them down to the floor so he could make a run for it, but one of them slammed his sneaker into Jean’s wrist and pressed it into the tiled floor. The bones in his arm scraped together and he nearly screamed.

“No!” he yelled, voice cracking. “I’m not -- I’m a girl!” he yelled. “I’m have to be in here, you don’t!”

His own words hit the three of them with shock. The two boys, for one, with dull terror. And Jean, with the crushing weight of self hate that always revolved around those words. They felt poisoned on his tongue. They weren’t supposed to be there.

The first removed his foot from Jean’s arm and backed away. “You don’t mean --”

Jean pulled aside the collar of his sweatshirt and snapped one of his sports bra straps at them with a look of reserved disgust on his face. He didn’t meat either of their eyes when they pulled away, rubbing their fists, clearly anxious.

“Oh,” one of them said. He sounded very small. “Sorry, I guess.”

“Yeah.” Jean muttered. He turned onto his side and hacked a cough, a little bit of blood speckling the cold, white tiles under his hands. He shivered.

The boys were already gone.

He curled into a ball and pulled at his hair, as if he could pull the poison from his brain through sheer force of will.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“How was the day?” Marco asked in a dull tone, expecting the same response as always. What he wasn’t expecting, however, was the slam of his truck’s door and Jean muttering to himself.

“Today was bullshit.” he hissed. “Absolute shit. I had to use the women’s room, which is already dangerous ‘cause it reminds everyone that they think I’m a girl, and then -- and fucking then! These two boys had the nerve to _follow me inside_ and scream at me for breaking the law or some shit, all while leering over me. And when I told him I wasn’t looking at their girlfriends or anything the grab me by the shirt…” he trailed off, huffing in frustration and burying his face in his hands.

“So, of course, I punch one of them ‘cause I’m terrified, and they start beating on me, and I had to -- I had to --” he chokes on his words.

He didn’t realize he was crying until he felt the wetness on his cheeks, Marco’s hand rubbing soothing circles into his back.

“It’s okay, Jean, you’re safe now.” Jean detected a note of something in his voice, but couldn’t pick it out until...anger. He was angry. Not at him, no, perhaps at himself, but definitely not at him.

Jean tried not to think about how terrified it felt to think someone was angry at him.

“I said it. I said what everyone want’s me to say. ‘I’m a girl.’ I’m a fucking --” he choked again, a dry sob catching him off guard.

Marco reached around him and pulled his body to the side. Jean let him. He just relaxed into his chest, let the warmth envelope him, let the sound of his heartbeat calm him just like his favorite songs. It felt so nice to have him around him. Marco was all he wanted to be -- no, not to be, just...want. That was it. The hard muscle beneath his forehead was surprisingly comfortable, and he wanted to be there, to let him take care of him. And suddenly, his hands were curling around his biceps.

Jean pressed forward with blurry vision and planted his lips against Marco’s.

The sudden, wonderful warmth overtook him, and for once, the heat felt _good._ Not dangerous or terrible, not frightening, but safe.

And then the guilt washed over him and he was running.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Marco just couldn’t catch a break.

A whirlwind of emotion ran through him, and he could only be sure of one thing -- this wasn’t fair. He had finally come to terms with the fact that he didn’t deserve Jean (though he wished he did) had finally kind of gotten over him (no, he definitely hadn’t) when he fell over him on the roof the day before (which was, admittedly, a wonderful experience, despite it being life or death), he had finally been _okay_ when there were lips on his, and warmth covering his chest, and then it was gone.

No, Jean was gone.

Still slightly dizzy from the kiss, Marco peered down at the seat beside him and found it empty. Jean had thrown open the door, and was running down the street in the opposite direction.

“Shit,” Marco muttered, fumbling at his seatbelt and climbing over Jean’s seat to exit the truck, only to look up and not see Jean anywhere. “ _Shit,_ ”

He launched himself back into his car, cranked it into gear, and drove off, out of the parking lot and in the direction of Jean.

He didn’t have to search for very long.

Marco found him in about an hour, wandering around near the highway, hands stuffed into his pockets with tear tracks down his face. His head was low and his hood was up -- he was trying to stay hidden. The thought sent a pang of emotion in Marco’s chest.

Instead of wallowing in the terrible pity, he pulled the truck off to the side of the road and got out. Jean spun around in fear. He took one look at the truck, and made to run away, when Marco called out for him to stop.

“Jean,” he yelled, perhaps a bit too loudly, and with more desperateness in his voice than he wanted, and Jean winced.

“I’m sorry,” he said lowly. Marco barely heard him over the sound of the cars whirring past them.

Marco shook his head. “Don’t be sorry. It’s okay.”

A scoff of annoyance fell from Jean’s lips, and he turned fully to face him, arms crossed across his chest protectively. “Of course it is. I just kissed you and you didn’t want me to, ad now I have to --” He was cut off quite suddenly, as his lips were already occupied.

Marco darted forward and wrapped his arms around his waist -- partially to keep him from running away, partially to hold him even closer -- and kissed him, hard. A small whine left Jean’s mouth as his hands fell to grab at the pocket of Marco’s sweatshirt. His head tilted to the side and their chaste kiss deepened.

Marco gripped at his sides possessively and nipped at Jean’s bottom lip, once, twice, pressing their foreheads together, his nose smashing against Jean’s cheek. A quiet happiness erupted in his chest. Warmth radiated off the place they were connected, contrasting to the wind whipping their hair into their faces, the cool shiver that ran down Marco’s spine every time Jean’s breath fanned across his face. It was almost like a movie moment, they way they stood beside the highway just before the sunset, freezing cold and burning up at the same time.

Marco pulled away after what felt like hours, just to stare down at Jean’s flushed face, his sharp nose, his eyes, and revel at how horribly in love he was.

“Oh,” Jean muttered under his breath.

With a giggle, Marco pressed a simple peck to the corner of his mouth. “I’m sorry.”

“I didn’t mind,”

“No, I know,” he chuckled. “I’m sorry for not telling you sooner.”

Jean rolled his eyes at how cheesy he was and looked up at the darkening sky. “I’m sorry for keeping us out so late.”

“I’m sorry for not being good enough for you.”

“I’m sorry you think you need to be better.”

“I’m sorry for...looking at your ass a lot…” Marco murmured sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck as he smiled down at his feet.

Jean laughed heavily. “Okay, you don’t really need to apologize for that.”

“I was trying to diffuse the tension!”

“What tension?”

Marco clutched his shoulders and kissed him again, licking at his mouth before pulling away and resting their foreheads against one another’s. “This tension, you dumbass.”

They drove back to Marco’s house, hands looped together on Marco’s thigh, replaying the events in their heads, wondering just how it was possible -- how it could have all been so perfect, and yet, still real.

They were late home, of course, so late that dinner had already been served. Marco’s mother scolded them. Jean knew she wasn’t as angry as she pretended to be, but still hung his head, still went along with it, and still helped Marco make sandwiches for them to eat up in their room. That was when they heard the knocking.

When Marco opened the front door, he wasn’t expecting to be met with three police officers and an angry middle aged woman. Then, he squinted and -- immediately slammed the door closed.

“Jean,” Marco hissed. “Get over here!”

Jean frowned, and made his way over from the kitchen. “What’s going on?”

“Is that your mom?” he asked, pointing at the peephole in the wooden door and ignoring the thumps at the knocker.

He peered into it, and his eyes widened with muted horror.

Marco promptly threw the door open.

The first cop, a burly man who looked like he had been formed with clay by an enthusiastic third grader whos only tool was a pizza roller, looked between the two of them with a raised eyebrow. “Is one of you Elizabeth Kirstein?”

Jean winced beside Marco, and locked their fingers together, squeezing with assurance. “I’m Jean, but yes.” His voice sounded very small.

“Oh baby,” his mother started. Marco was terrified for a moment that she would try to convince him otherwise, but instead she just reached out and ran a thumb underneath the old bruise Mr. Kirstein had given him. Her eyes softened -- caramel the same shade as Jean’s, with just a bit more warmth -- as they ran over his appearance. “I’m so sorry.” she murmured. There was true sadness in her voice. Marco immediately trusted her.

The first cop rolled his eyes a bit, and took a step closer. “May we come in?” he asked gruffly.

They stepped back to allow them to come forward.

Marco thanked God his parents were already upstairs, and prayed they would stay that way. Despite his worries, he smiled and offered the men sandwiches.

(None of them accepted.)

(Marco was kind of glad.)  
“So, Jean, hm?” Mrs. Kirstein asked gently. “I like it. Very french, good to your grandmother. I’m sure she’d love to hear.”

Jean had to hold back a small sob. Instead, he dove forward and crushed her in a hug.

And then they were crying.

Mother and son, gripping each other, as if to assure themselves that they were there, hugging and muttering in annoyance and affection. His mother ruffled his hair and told him it was getting too long, Jean commented on how much of her roots were showing up from her dye job, and they were smiles and wrinkles and happy tears and Marco was _happy_.

One of the officers cleared his throat loudly, and they stepped away from each other.

“I’m taking my child home with me,” Mrs. Kirstein told them, voice laced with venom.

“Ma’am, we discussed this earlier,” he told her with a tone of annoyance. “Your divorce is being filed, but the child must choose who…” he squinted at Jean without even an attempt at being subtle, as if he could see into his very chromosomes with one inquisitive look. “ _they_ want to stay with, until the court rules that abuse came into play, or just some precaution. Besides, Mr. Kirstein plans on keeping her under some strict rules if they want to come back home, for her safety. The name change definitely won’t be tolerated on his part. I can assure you --”

“They can’t see it came into play _now?_ ” Mrs. (or, rather, Ms.) Kirstein exploded. “Look at her face, look at that bruise! That man punched my child in the face! I don’t care what the court says, I’m --”

“Ma’am I _told_ you, that man has much more influence than you do in this town. Besides, we can all agree that the safety of your child would be much higher if she was with him and wasn’t choosing to go down this life path.”

Seeing the fuming look on Ms. Kirstein’s face, Marco suddenly realized why there were two back up policemen accompanying the main.

“I’m going home with my mom.” Jean whispered.

Marco reached over and took his hand. He squeezed it once, and when Jean looked over at him for reassurance, he smiled at him.

Jean grabbed the front of his sweatshirt and buried his nose in his chest. Their arms curled around each other, and then they weren’t, and it was okay.

“Go home, Jean.” he whispered.

Jean grinned. “Yeah. I’m gonna go home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So close to the end! Remember, smut in the epilogue. I promised Jean would get happiness.
> 
> Plz find me on tumblr at the-mega-trans-sjw and message rec me fics...particularly trans!fics I will follow u and love you forever


	10. Monster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I love my two dorks  
> 10/10 would write again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mainly intensely fluffy smut. Don't judge me.

Things were significantly better, living the lonely life. Not that Jean was _alone_ , per say, as he never was. His new school in Mitras was full to the brim. That, of course, meant finding a group of oddballs who all turned out to be extremely gay after Jean started to eat lunch with them.

Jean still missed Marco fiercely, but what could he say, dodging baby carrots was better than dodging fists.

“I’m telling you, it’s not that gay!”

“Shut the fuck up Jaeger, you are so fucking gay. You’re like...exclusively gay. You’re like _Ymir._ ”

“I am not, I am a proud, labelless man, right Jean?”

Jean just rolled his eyes. “I don’t know, Eren, seems pretty gay to me.” He wiggled his eyebrows at him a bit just to get his point across, and Eren shut up with a loud huff.

He leaned forward onto his crossed arms and muffled into the crook of his elbow.

Reiner scooted up next to him and mockingly cupped a hand behind his ear. “Huh? What was that?”

Eren slammed his fists down on the table. “I said I’m as gay as you two, asshat!”

Jean instinctively leaned to the side as the speck of orange peel flew past his head. With a chuckle, he looked down between his legs and pretended to eat more of his sandwich.

**To: Marco <3  
Hey, my mom’s going on some weird date night sleepover with her girlfriends this weekend, think you can drive the truck up here to stay with me fri-sat night?**

He bit his lip. He sent the text during first period, and still hadn’t gotten an answer yet. To say he was nervous was an understatement. He wasn’t exactly alluding to anything in the text, but...maybe...screw it, he hadn’t seen Marco in weeks (unless you count low-quality skype calls, which he really didn’t) and he deserved a night alone with him. Cuddling, making food together, maybe --

“Hey, Jean, who’s Marco?” someone giggled into his ear and he rocketed away and into the body next to him. Annie gave him a slight glare before returning to her yogurt.

“He’s...uh, well,” Jean stammered, face heating up like a furnace, before he frowned. “Shut up, Jaeger!”

Eren grabbed his phone and read the message fast as lightning, grin spreading to his ears in the same amount of time. “Ooh, you going on a date with him?”

“Give that back!”

Reiner grinned at Jean. “Just remember to use protection, and --” Bertold flushed, attempting to stop his boyfriend from speaking when he stood up and declared, “Don’t forget blowjobs!”

Jean planted his face in his hands.

Connie, the small hispanic baldie of the group looked around in confusion as the four boys wrestled for control of Jean’s phone.

“But -- how is this Marco guy gonna give him a blowjob if he doesn’t have a d--”

_“Connie!”_

Now, it was Jean’s turn to flush. He squinted at the group of them with suspicion as both Sasha and Bertold tried to cover Connie’s unsuspecting mouth with their hands.

“What Connie was going to say, was you don’t have a fear of _dedication_ , and he therefore wouldn’t have to blow you to keep you in a relationship, unlike himself.” Sasha said, glaring at Connie from the side. Connie nodded and “hmph!”-ed into their collective hands.

It took Jean a lot of strength to just roll his eyes. “I don’t care if you guys know, it’s all good.”

“Know what?” Annie and Mikasa asked at once.

Jean sighed. This wasn’t exactly what he’d have liked to explain in lunchroom conversation. “I’m trans. I don’t exactly have a dick, and these douchebags --” he waved towards where Eren and Reiner were staring eachother down. “Somehow found out and didn’t” He frowned at them. “...ask me?”

Reiner shrugged. “I couldn’t care less, if we’re being honest.”

Eren huffed. “Well, _I_ care, but these fuckwads wouldn’t let me talk to you about it! You know Levi’s trans, and he’s so fucking hot holy shit, but like? What do I do, I don’t know my way around a--”

“We’ve heard enough about you crushing on a senior, Eren, give it a rest.” Mikasa mumbled, and that was it, and Jean felt -- happy. He felt happy, and safe.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Marco texted back that night.

Jean was sitting in his new bedroom alone, resting back on a mound of pillows as he completed his homework. The room was simple -- wide, with off-gray walls and white christmas lights, a queen sized bed and three windows to let in natural light. His mother, the stylist she was, set it up for him when she first rented the apartment they were staying in. Jean liked it much better than sleeping on a matress on the floor in Marco’s bedroom, but after a while of that, his room seemed a bit...lonely.

Just like school. Despite the fact that he had many friends, he’d grown attached to Marco. He’d grown used to seeing him everyday when he woke up, every afternoon when he came to pick him up from school and sweep him away from all the shit that went down when he was _at_ school.

Which reminded him, this school was much better than his older. The teachers were friendly and kind, and more importantly, no one but the principle knew he was trans. Well, besides his friends, but that didn’t bother Jean. The only thing that really did was the lack of Marco...and the extra homework. The courses he was taking at his new school were much better -- but they came with three times as much homework as his first did. Jean just couldn’t concentrate on work for that much time in a row. He was looking for a distraction half-way through his AP Physics worksheet when his phone made a loud _ding!_

Unbeknownst to him, Marco had replied. He peered down at the screen, saw Marco’s name, and a grin split his face.

Jean squealed into his sweatshirt sleeves. “Totally not a dork,” he muttered to himself, face heating up at the thought of his boyfriend texting him back. He took a moment to shake his head and bury his face into his pillow. “Calm down, you gay ass, it’s just a boy,” he mumbled. It still took him a couple of minutes to do so, but he did, eventually. Taking in a couple of deep breaths, Jean scrolled upwards on his phone to see what he had responded with.

**From: Marco <3**

**Yeah of course, like at what time?**

With a smile that reached his ears, Jean tapped out a reply as soon as possible. He flopped back onto his bed and tucked his pillow into his arms, hugging it to his chest and burying his nose into the soft fabric. His socked feet brushed over the down of his blanket as he brushed his feet back and forth over it in excitement.

Marco was coming. Jean couldn’t wait. He felt happiness bubbling up in his chest at the mere thought.

Of course, the sound of the man who lived next door placing a stack of glass plates down on his granite countertop startled him enough to calm those feeling down.

Living in an apartment with virtually no wall thickness kind of sucked.

At school the next day, Jean couldn’t stop thinking about Marco. This was more due to the fact that he kept texting him in the middle of his classes. Once, when Jean scolded him for being a distraction, Marco sent him a particularly adorable classroom selfie with the caption **deal with it ;)** and the salsa dancer emoji. Jean retaliated with a particularly stealthy photo of his middle finger under his desk.

He felt his cheeks warm up every time his phone buzzed -- but this was more so because of friend group than because of Marco.

You see, every time his text notification went off, he got looks from all sides and a chorus of “oooooooohhh”’s filling his ears. Not to mention the knowing looks Reiner kept sending him from around Berthold's shoulder. They all seemed to act like they knew more than Jean, and that bothered him. He felt out of the loop.

Of course, with the fiery blush that covered his face whenever he read one of Marco’s texts or saw one of his selfies kind of distracted him.

It was rearing closer to Friday, and Jean couldn’t wait. He spent all day thinking about spending time with him. Marco was so big compared to him, just _thinking_ of the cuddles and the possibilities brought his heart sailing over a (incredibly gay) rainbow. It was when he caught Connie slipping a box of condoms into his backpack that he began to realize just exactly his group was suggesting.

The thought made him blush even hotter.

When Friday did finally arrive, Jean was ready.

He made it home just in time to see his mom walk out the front door to their apartment. She looked up to see him standing there just as she was about to lock the door. “Oh, Jean-bo,” she murmured. The nick-name made his heart swell. “I didn’t realize you were there. Here, go in, I’ll lock up after you.”

She kissed him quickly on the cheek and ruffled his hair, and he was home alone.

As hard as it was to admit to himself, Jean was kind of scared.

He...he wanted Marco. And that was a problem.

Jean wrapped his arms around his middle and pulled his sweatshirt hood over his head, stuffing his hot face into his hands. He plopped down on the couch and pulled his legs underneath him as he tried to calm his beating heart. Marco -- he loved him, he wanted him, he was going to be around him, and it should be _good_ but he was still _terrified._ He knew he shouldn’t be. Marco had told him himself, on various occasions, that he considered him super manly, and attractive, and hot, but there was always the little voice in the back of his head that whispered otherwise.

He wanted to be comfortable around him. He wanted to be comfortable with his body. He wanted _Marco_ to be comfortable around his body. The only way to prove this to himself would to be just doing it.

And still, Jean knew his own boundaries. He knew what he was comfortable doing to himself, what made him feel too feminine, what made him feel gross and unhappy, and what made him feel good. He just wasn’t sure if he would be able to communicate this to Marco well enough.

He spent so much time wallowing around in his conflicting thoughts of want and fear that he didn’t even realize Marco was here until he knocked on the apartment’s door for the second time.

Jean shot to his feet. He raced into the foyer, socks sliding on the hardwood floor, and threw the door open. Marco stood there, eyebrows lifted in surprise, fist still raised to knock on the door. Jean grinned up at him. And suddenly, he was wrapped up in a hug so big and warm it quelled every bit of anxiety he had.

He buried his nose in the crook of his neck, kissing there lightly until Marco pulled away to pepper his face with his lips. Jean giggled as he pulled him forward by the hips and kissed him sweetly. His arms wrapped around his neck without his permission, and he kissed him back just as eagerly.

Resting their foreheads together, Jean opened his eyes to look into Marco’s chocolate brown ones. “I missed you,” he whispered.

Marco laughed out loud and hugged him again. The scent of chocolate and minty toothpaste, mixed with the smell of plain _Marco_ assaulted his nose. “I missed you too, you dork. It’s good to see you.”

“Hm,” Jean hummed in agreement. “Do you want to make cookies?”

He rubbed his nose into the crown of Jean’s head. “I don’t really want to let go.”

“Me neither -- oomph!”

Jean yelped in surprise as his thighs were lifted with large, strong hands and he was being carried away towards the kitchen.

“Marco, Marco, don’t drop me, please,”

“I’m not going to drop you, you’re fine, you nerd,” he muttered into his collarbone as he set Jean down on the counter beside the fridge and began to kiss him thoroughly breathless. Jean groaned, carding his fingers through Marco’s hair as he started to lose the ability to think. He was so _warm_. Ther chest pressed together with no room to move, their legs tangled, the length of their bodies pressed so close it felt like fire was lighting between them. Jean sighed with happiness. Jean’s arms over Marco’s shoulders, Marco’s caging him in from both sides. This is where he wanted to be. Surrounded by Marco, warm, safe, together.

Marco pressed his forehead to him again and pulled away, leaving just enough space between their mouths for him to whisper. “Can I -- can I go down on you?”

Jean’s heart nearly stopped.

His eyes widened, full of question, and a bit of fear, but mostly just _want._ “You don’t have to,” he whispered, but Marco cut him off with a hard kiss. Teeth nibbled at his bottom lip, a warm tongue swiping over the bites in apology, and Jean practically whimpered.

“I wouldn’t have asked,” he muttered, punctuating his words with kisses. “If I didn’t want to. I wanna make you feel good.”

This time, Jean’s heart swelled, and heat grew deep in his belly, flaring out until his legs felt hot and shaky, his chest burning with affection and anticipation.

“Okay,” he whispered against Marco’s lips.

“Okay? Like, you want to, you’re not just letting me --”

“No, you douche, _touch me._ ”

Marco didn’t have to be told twice.

His hands gripped Jean’s thighs and spread them enough to step between them, slotting his thighs on either side of his hips. He squeezed him there, gently, but enough for Jean to feel it, and he whined.

“Get me off this hard-ass counter,” he muttered, and Marco giggled.

“Where’s your bedroom?” he asked, and they were meandering through the apartment, refusing to take their eyes (or hands) off each other. Finally, Marco pressed him against the door to his bedroom and nipped at his neck, throwing the door open so he could lay him down on the edge of the bed. Jean rested back with his legs hanging over the edge. Marco pushed his knees between them and pulled their hips flush against each other’s. Jean sighed at the contact.

Pulling away with a breathy gasp, Marco gazed down at him from where he was hovering. “I need you to tell me boundaries. I just...” he placed his hands just above Jean’s chest, pointedly avoiding touching there. “I don’t know what to do with my hands.

Jean chuckled. “You don’t need to be so nervous, you know.”

“Yeah, but...this is different. From anything I’ve done. And you’re special. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.” he smiled against Jean’s neck.

With his chest bubbling in happiness at the sweetness of that statement, and the arousal pressing against him through his boxers, Jean let out a small laugh. He leaned up and pushed Marco until he was sitting up and Marco was standing. “I want to keep my sweatshirt on, but I have to take my binder off or I’ll suffocate when -- things get hot and heavy.” he muttered breathily. “Other than my chest, everything is free game. I just --” he cleared his throat. “I don’t want anything inside of me. That would make me uncomfortable.”

Marco nodded with his eyes wide and watched his lips parted as Jean tugged his sweatshirt off and over his head, revealing his slim waist and the curve of his hips, the way his hip bones poked out, looking delicious as the taut muscles of his stomach and sides flexed. He swallowed, hard, as more pale, soft skin was revealed when Jean struggled to tug the skin-tight spandex and cotton of his binder over his chest and shoulders. His heart stuttered in his chest when the baggy sweat shirt was pulled back over his torso. “Fuck, Jean,” he whispered, and yanked his own shirt off without being asked.

The sight of Jean staring up at him with flushed cheeks, practically swamped in the fabric of the sweater, sent a shiver down his spine. He lifted the hem just far enough to grip his bare hips. His pinkie fingers sneaking underneath the hem of his jeans and boxers.

Jean’s breath hitched. “Marco, if you don’t hurry up, I will personally --”

What, Marco never found out. Jean was cut off by a strangled noise in the back of his throat as Marco tugged his jeans off in in one swift movement and began to mouth at his exposed hipbones.

“Fuck,” he murmured. Jean lifted his hand to cover his mouth, and the unholy, frustrated whine that left his mouth turned Marco on more than anything else ever had in his whole life.

Marco kissed the edge of his boxer briefs and looked up at him from where he was kneeling on the floor. He tugged one of Jean’s thighs up so it rested on his bare shoulder. “Is this okay?” he asked, tugging at the last bit of fabric that separated them.

With a shaky nod, Jean looked down at him, nestled between his legs, peering up at him, chocolate brown eyes clouded and pupils blown wide and dark.

Marco slid the black fabric down his thighs slowly, kissing and nibbling the soft, pale skin of the inside of his thighs as he went.

“Have you --” Jean started, biting back another embarrassingly high-pitched noise. “Have you been researching, or something?” he asked. He was so turned on it was ridiculous, precome wet on the inside of his legs, his arousal hard and hot. Not to mention, dorky little Marco was acting unbearably sexy, which was _not_ fair, not fair at all.

With a grin pressed against his leg, Marco settled himself more comfortably on his knees. Jean’s legs hung off the bed and over his shoulder, giving him a quite literal faceful of just _Jean._ “I have done some research, actually,” he admitted. “It wasn’t very fun, but I think I’ve got the gist of it, don’t you?” he asked, and then he was licking a very purposeful strip up Jean’s arousal.

Jean tipped his head back into the bed and trembled. A sharp, high pitched gasp left his lips. He bit down on his bottom lip hard, trying to quell the feeling of losing control.

Marco just watched in fascination. The perfect arch of his back sent waves of heat through him, and he repeated the same action with his tongue. He flicked the point of his tongue on the upswing, mouthing at his cock with his lips before sucking gently. Jean’s legs shivered and clenched tighter around Marco’s head.

A quiet string of “please, please, please…” fell from his lips, blubbering and stammering as Marco just sucked _harder_ , and he felt himself unraveling.

“You’re good Jean, you’re so good,” he heard Marco whisper against his thighs, and he just lost it.

He was clutching the blankets beside him, Marco’s mused hair, for some sort of anchor to keep him grounded because it was _so much,_ and he almost couldn’t take it. He loved him _so much_ he needed him, he needed him closer, “ _Marco,_ ”

Marco growled at the sound of his name being said like that. He flattened his tongue and pressed purposefully against his most sensitive place and moved his jaw up, just like the article had said, and Jean whimpered.

He looked up to see tears from overstimulation gathering in the corners of Jean’s eyes. An intense bout of pure affection washed over him. He kissed him gently and stared up at him, hands clutching his hips. “Are you okay?” he asked.

Jean’s breath was coming in short, hard pants. “Yes, yes, _god,_ yes, please don’t stop. Just...it’s so much, Marco.”

Ignoring the swell of pride in his heart at that, Marco returned to licking him torturously slow and tongueing at his entrance.

Embarrassingly quickly, Jean found himself reaching his peak. “Marco, Marc -- _oh,_ , hnng…” he murmured, almost like a plea. His fingernails dug into his scalp, his back arched completely off his mattress, and it was _so good_ and he couldn’t hold on any longer.

He only managed a warning in the form of a high pitched “I’m!” and his orgasm was washing over him like a tsunami.

Marco continued to work his tongue through Jean’s after shakes and held his quivering thighs still as they tried to close around his head like a vice.

When he could finally regain a normal pace of breath, Jean looked down to see Marco pushing his sweater up to press soft, feather like kisses against his barely-there happy trail and soft tummy, smilling like an idiot the whole time.

Jean managed a laugh at that.

“Was it good?” Marco asked, nuzzling into his collarbones as blissed-out giggles fell from his lips.

“Hell yeah,” Jean breathed. “Best. The good. I don’t even know what I’m saying.”

He curled his arms around Marco’s neck and pulled him closer, only noticing his own hard on pressing against his thigh when Marco came to rest on the bed beside him. Jean reached down to unbutton his pants when a hand grabbed his wrist.

His eyes were still blown wide, desperate, wanting, but he still managed to look concerned. “You don’t have to,” he whispered, but Jean rolled his eyes.”

Jean threw his own words back at him. “I wouldn’t be offering if I didn’t want to.”

Marco smiled. His usual, bubbly, happy Marco smile with his freckles shining against his brown skin. His hair was disheveled from Jean’s fingers gripping it, his face was flushed and hot with arousal, and Jean was just _so in love_ he had to tell him.

“I love you,” he said, tugging Marco’s pants and boxers down to his thighs. “I love you, I love you. I love you so much. I love --”

He wrapped a hand around his aching, hard cock and tugged his hand back upward. He stroked Marco through his climax as he groaned out various praises, nose buried in Jean’s neck. He kissed and licked and sucked as Jean stroked his cock from base to tip, accentuating each pull of his fingers with a declaration of his love. Marco was so far gone. He was so happy, and it was so much, so warm, so close, and he just wanted to get closer.

Finally, heat wracked through him as he groaned and panted into Jean’s skin, spilling into his fist.

He kissed him on both cheeks. He kissed the corners of his mouth, the tip of his nose, his eyelashes. He kissed him on the mouth, deeply and full of affection, and he knew.

Jean was worth all of the trouble Marco could attempt to fix.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaaaaand we're done! I'm kind of sad, we're done with this. What was it, twenty weeks in the making?? that's insane!!! But anyways, I love you guys so much and all of you are amazing.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna make this a chaptered fic because I can and I want to write more about trans characters. If you've read any of my other stuff, you'll know that I normally update every week, so lets hope the same is said for this one :^)


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